Happenstance
by kashfaberry
Summary: Rachel Berry is selfish, spoiled, and out of control – at least according to her parents. The obvious solution is to send her to an all-boys school, complete with a totally appropriate and totally gay new roommate by the name of Blaine Anderson.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: **Happenstance**  
Author: **Kashfaberry

Disclaimer: We do not own _Glee._

**a/n: **we're taking on our first chapter fic, which is thankfully outlined and ready to be written, but we do each have our own projects at the same time, so updates may not come as quick as they should. also, this fic is loosely inspired on a klaine fic ashley found a while ago:_ where we went right_ by **beautifulwhatsyourhurry** on (and if you want the link for it, please PM ashley on her berrywarbler account, because she'll happily supply it to you-it's a wonderful fic, really).

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Private school.

This was supposed to be the answer to the problem her fathers saw in her, the 'easy fix' to a problem that wouldn't have even been there had they spent more than a weekend a month in the same city as their darling daughter. If they had bothered to show up to any one of her numerous dance recitals, show choir competitions, drama club performances, maybe she wouldn't have resorted to such desperate measures for an ounce of attention. As it was, they hadn't, and Rachel's latest outburst of rebellion proved to have gone too far for their taste as they showed her pamphlets to a boarding school a few hours away.

"Dalton is an all-boys school," Rachel pointed out on the evening her fathers' sat her down to discuss their plans.

"Given that it's my alma matter, you might be shocked to find I know this," Leroy answered her with a slight chuckle, ignoring the attitude she'd been sporting since they came up with the absurd plan. "However, we're quite close to a majority of the Board of Trustees over there, not to mention the headmaster." The fact that they were willing to give a generous donation atop of the ridiculous tuition to keep Rachel there went unsaid as she crossed her arms over her chest, glaring at her fathers. She didn't think it was fair for her life to be uprooted so they could travel to lands far and near, rarely taking her with except for the odd trip to Manhattan during school vacations. Even then, she'd been raised with a nanny and had someone else watching over her. Once again she was left to wonder why they'd even bothered going through the trouble of finding a surrogate if they spent so little time with the child they had to fight to have.

"So this is your solution? Ship me off so you never have to see me?" She asked, tone biting and harsh and her fathers exchanged a glance before Hiram took one of her hands between his own.

"It's not like that at all. You've just strayed from the path we expected of you, Rachel, and this is the most practical answer on our question of what to do."

She fought it every step of the way during the two weeks her fathers' actually stayed in the house to process her transfer, McKinley sending her off with the best of regards, only a few actually sad to see her go. The glee club there, the one she had helped raise and prosper, had thrown her a small going away party, her best friend Quinn wrapping an arm around her waist and holding on to her the entire time.

"You may be abandoning us to live out what is probably Lopez's dream," she started, grinning at the girl in question who didn't even object from her place on Puckerman's lap, "but you're going to come home when you can, right?"

"As long as you don't think I'm going to help you sabotage the Warblers," Rachel grinned, bumping her hip slightly into the blondes with a small laugh. "After all, I am one of them now."

"Well, you know we had to instigate that rule about no traitors in the choir room," Finn said with a smile as he easily lifted her up, Rachel squealing as she was carried out of the school with the rest of the club following, Finn passing her off to Puckerman before she was placed on the ground outside her car, Tina handing her her bag so she could throw it inside the vehicle.

"I'm going to miss you guys," she said sadly, pouting a little as they all moved in to hug her at the same time, Mike and Sam elbowing one another as they tried to get closer, Quinn practically glued to Rachel's side as she whispered 'You'll get through it, Rach, you always do.'

She took Quinn's words to heart as she was driven to Westerville in her own car the next morning, Hiram fiddling anxiously with the radio as Leroy led the way in his car in front of them, Rachel pouting in the passenger seat of her own while Hiram tried to talk up the school. She didn't understand how sending her to an all-boys school was supposed to _tame _her from whatever scandals they felt she got up to when they were gone, but he assured her that the constant 24/7 watch on the boys there was enforced and would keep Rachel in control and back onto the path they had set out for her so many years ago. She kept a snort to herself, not bothering to ask why she wasn't being sent to a sister school or some sort - she'd looked on the website, and the closest all girls boarding school was in an entirely different state - trying to focus on the next time she could escape back to Lima and spend time with the friends she was leaving behind.

Rachel was told to sit outside of the headmasters office when they arrived while final arrangements were made inside with her fathers, Rachel huffing impatiently as she watched boys pass in and out of the main hall that she was seated in. It was like a sea of navy, with stripes of red here and there, a quiet level of laughing and talking as classes transitioned, and Rachel was not looking forward to having her own set of blazers fitted the next afternoon. She might not have been particularly fashion forward, but she enjoyed the freedom of her sundresses and sweaters that weren't limited to two colors, enjoyed that she could wear lime green or sunshine yellow and no one would think it was odd. It was stifling, almost, and she hated the place all the more for it. She was going to blend in, as much as being an only girl in a school of 500 boys could, and nothing irritated her more.

"Rachel?" her father called, and it was with a heavy sigh that she followed him into an elegant office, full of large wooden furniture, walls littered with bookcases and important looking books, an older man sitting behind the desk that seemed to take up far more space than necessary. "This is Headmaster Dickens," he introduced, the man shaking Rachel's hand as she pasted on a fake smile for him.

"Now, as I was just telling your fathers, there's unfortunately no single rooms available for you to stay in, so you'll be paired up with a roommate," the headmaster told her once she took a seat in a large chair between her two fathers, Rachel's eyebrows furrowing in confusion.

"That can't possibly be allowed," she said aloud, the headmaster chuckling lightly as he shook his head.

"We're already making exceptions to allow you into our school, we figured one more wouldn't hurt," he replied with a small smile. "We've set you up to room with a charming young man named Blaine, Anderson I believe. Head of the junior class, lead soloist of the Warblers - so you'll have an ally in there once you start attending rehearsals - and a member of the boxing club."

She wanted to make a retort about how he sounded just perfect in one of the voices she used when being completely sarcastic and not wanting anyone to catch on, but Leroy caught her eye and seemed to follow her train of thought. "He's also 100% gay," he explained, Rachel's smile not falling for a second as she continued to fake the happiness she knew they wanted from her.

"Boyfriend and everything, if my links to the rumor mill are still accurate," the headmaster agreed, shuffling some papers on the top of his desk. "That doesn't mean we won't be closely watching your actions, Ms. Berry, because we will be keeping a close eye on you to make sure there aren't any problems, but Blaine seemed like the best fit."

She wanted to roll her eyes but was saved the horror of having the three men catching her as a knock on the door distracted them, the headmaster calling out a loud 'come in!' and smiling serenely at a boy only slightly taller than she was, dressed in the same blazer and slacks as every other boy she'd seen on the premises so far, hair only slightly tamed by gel and hazel eyes Rachel feared she'd get distracted in.

"Sorry I'm late, Headmaster Dickens," the boy said, switching the messenger bag he carried to his opposite shoulder, freeing his hand to shake the headmasters before turning his attention to her fathers, greeting them politely as he shook both their hands, smiling innocently in Rachel's direction where she stayed seated, clearly not impressed by his well-bred, cheerful manners.

"Not at all, class ran late again I would assume?" the headmaster asked, clearly taken in by the boys effortless smile and easy charm.

He let out a small chuckle and nodded. "AP Physics," he explained to her fathers, "it's a lot of work, but if you want to get into the best universities, you can't exactly sit back and coast."

It was the same kind of bullshit Rachel had heard come from Quinn's mouth plenty of times when her mother hounded her about being the perfect daughter she needed, sloshed out of her mind before retreating to her living room while Quinn and Rachel went through dance routines and singing rehearsals in peace once more. Something they said to impress adults, not something they actually believed. She listened silently as he ran through a list of extracurriculars he took part in, her parents draining him of every question they could come up with, asking more about his own life than they ever had her past boyfriends, or even her own. It seemed ridiculous that they pretend to care this much, and his answers seemed only too practiced, too perfect, and it served to piss Rachel off more the longer she sat there.

Finally they seemed impressed enough that they offered to help Rachel move into her dorm, her fathers each carrying a box up to the room while Blaine led the way, not yet having said an actual word to Rachel. She wondered if he was annoyed for having to give up the luxury of a double as a single, but then decided she didn't really care too much since she was being far more put out than he was. Besides, she fumed silently, he seemed far too polite to say a word if he did feel frustrated at the imposition.

Her fathers left shortly thereafter, leaving the two alone in their room for the first time, Blaine helping her move the boxes off her bed so she could put her own sheets on the mattress. "Do you want any help?" he offered, not unkindly, but she just shot him a glare.

"No," she snapped, his eyes widening in surprise but he didn't say anything, simply backed away.

"Are you sure?" he asked again, Rachel ignoring him completely as she frowned at the rather small twin mattress she was expected to sleep in. She wasn't supposed to downgrade to this until college, she thought bitterly, but pulled the new pack of pink sheets she had bought specifically for Dalton out of a nearby box regardless and began to make her bed, Blaine leaning against his desk and watching her silently, Rachel feeling his eyes trained on her. She knew she should play nice, that she had to live with him until the end of the year, but nice had never been Rachel's game, and she half-hoped if he told someone that she was a bitch, she'd be kicked out of this insane deal.

She heard him move around behind her, focused only on the menial task of making a bed she didn't want to sleep in, before he cleared his throat and caused her to finally turn around and acknowledge him. "I have to get back to classes," he said, Rachel staring blankly at him, "but I wrote my number here-" he showed off a piece of notebook paper before placing it on what Rachel assumed was her own desk, "and if you need anything, just text or something."

She nodded shortly, Blaine seeming to accept that that was the most she was going to respond before he grabbed his bag once more and exited, hesitating by the door before disappearing through it, Rachel slumping on her bed with her head against the wall once she was alone once more, biting her lip and trying her hardest not to cry.

**-:-**

After an hour of crying into her favorite pillow, Rachel decided enough was enough, and attempted to gather her wits and unpack more of her belongings. By the time she got to her desk, she smiled at the loopy script from Blaine and added his number to her phone, but didn't bother texting him. She wasn't up for being around people, not anyone that was around Dalton at least. At 4pm, when she glanced at the clock as she opened up a box full of stuff for the en suite bathroom only juniors and seniors received in their dorm rooms, she felt a pang of heartbreak, knowing that New Directions was moving on without her, Finn probably failing tragically at a dance step as Mike tried to move them through the choreography they needed for their upcoming Sectionals win.

It hurt, to know that they didn't _really _need her to win, even when Quinn texted her a video of Puck begging her to come back so they didn't have to witness Finn and Santana attempting to duet together, a smile tugging at her lips for the first time all day as she texted back a small _miss you guys too. _

She hadn't even realized that most of the afternoon had passed and that it was turning dark outside until she folded her last sweater in the set of drawers she had been given, the uniform she had to take with her hidden as far away from her eyesight until she actually had to put it on. She debated momentarily on giving in and texting Blaine to ask where, exactly, she was supposed to get food from, but opted for a shower instead, changing into her pajamas afterwards even if it was still early evening.

She had a tendency to sleep in as little as possible, often getting hot in the middle of the night, but figured for now she'd settle for an old tee from their venture to Nationals the previous school year and her favorite gold star boxers. If they were going to have to live together, Rachel was going to have to be comfortable, and there was no use wasting time in easing Blaine into her insanity.

Still, she felt a little bad when he blushed red when he walked in, a styrofoam container in hand that he held up for her. "You didn't text me, and I'm not even sure what you eat, but there were French fries at dinner and everyone loves those."

"You brought me food?" she asked, pulling her legs underneath herself and taking the container from him before he dropped his own school bag on his bed, loosening the tie he wore under his blazer.

"Did you want to starve?" he asked bluntly, and Rachel just smiled in response.

"Thank you," she said after a moment, swirling a fry around in ketchup before glancing at her desk where she still had a few photos to put up, not to mention her favorite poster. She hadn't yet figured out where she was going to put them, but Blaine broke her reverie with a simple question, turning her attention back to him as he hung his blazer on the back of his chair, the simple white button up he wore underneath it framing his body in a way that Rachel could objectively appreciate.

"What exactly did you do to wind up here?"

She chewed on her lip slightly, deliberating for a moment. She could have made up an elaborate lie, but Blaine was going to end up knowing her whether she wanted him to or not, and in the end the truth won out as she started telling her story. "My dads - they're not around often. Which means that when my glee club-"

"The New Directions, right?" he interrupted, much to Rachel's chagrin, but she nodded.

"Yes," she answered calmly, placing the half eaten container of fries on her desk and began to placing the photo frames she had around the various surfaces as she continued talking, "whenever they wanted to throw a party, it only made sense to do so at my house. No parents, plenty of alcohol, the perfect situation."

"Any teenagers dream," Blaine agreed as he snagged one of her fries.

"But they came home during one and decided enough was enough, and here I am." He tilted his head, shaking his head as if he didn't really believe her.

"Kids throw parties all the time. There's more to it than that," he said, and she just sighed in frustration as she placed the last photo on her nightstand, of her and Quinn and Puck and Finn all standing in front of the Stairs to Broadway from their adventure to New York the spring previously, smiling sadly at it before sitting on her bed to give him the whole story.

"This wasn't a tame party," Rachel explained, and he sat and listened as she gave him the whole 9 yards - how Puck had come up to her and asked when they were going to throw another party, even if it was just for their group, how Rachel had given him the date when she knew her parents wouldn't be home - they hadn't been set to arrive to the next day, and she had plenty of experience in knowing how to clean quickly and proficiently. How it had gotten out of hand quicker than normal with Artie, Sam and Santana lighting up in one corner of her basement, Blaine's eyes shooting up in surprise at that statement as he asked her if she smoked. "Of course not," she replied, annoyed at his interruption, "any sort of smoke could ruin my lungs. I wouldn't do anything to risk my voice."

"Of course," he said by way of apology, "continue."

And so she did, going on to explain that her fathers had walked into their backyard at the sound of noises from their hot tub only to find Brittany and Puckerman fucking in the hot tub; Finn, Mike, Kurt, Tina and Mercedes doing shots of their most expensive liquor in the kitchen and finally landing on Rachel making out with Quinn in the living room.

"Your two gay dads got mad at you for making out with a girl?" he questioned with confusion, Rachel rolling her eyes as she moved to pick up her favorite poster that she had brought with her, trying to figure out where she wanted to hang it.

"Don't be ridiculous," she scoffed. "I think they were probably more upset to walk in on their daughter with her top off and her friends hand up her skirt." Blaine paled a little at that, but she simply held out her poster in an attempt to ask for help, climbing up onto her bed in order to hang it above the furniture.

"That would be a bit disconcerting," he agreed, holding her steady by her calves as she attempted to even the edges of her poster. "Do you usually make a habit out of kissing girls?" he inquired as she taped down one corner, tongue between her teeth as she focused.

She raised an eyebrow and shook her head, "Quinn and I are just friends who occasionally fool around when we're drunk or bored," she answered, grinning as she noticed him glance up her shorts, even if it was unintentional. "I tend to border on straight, most days," she finished, "so we're supposedly batting for the same team."

"Supposedly?" he asked, looking more confused than he had all evening.

"Well, let's just say that I probably wouldn't have been as subtle as you are about looking up girl's clothing," she teased gently, his face flushing red as he let out a small chuckle.

"I promise I didn't mean to," he told her, and whether it was truth or lie, she honestly couldn't tell as he helped her off her bed, poster perfectly in place. "But I have a feeling you'll get along perfectly with Sebastian."

"The mysterious boyfriend?" she inquired, Blaine nodding by way of answer as he moved to his side of the room to work on his homework, Rachel grabbing her phone to text her friends. But even as he started humming quietly to himself, a song she couldn't quite place, she thought Blaine might not be nearly as insufferable as she had imagined.

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_we write, you read, you review, we'll write more. ~ Ashley and Kira_


	2. Chapter 2

Blaine lounged on the couch in the Warbler's practice room, his legs stretched out leisurely across Sebastian's lap as the rest of the council filed in, though he could still hear Wes yelling at one of the underclass members about always being half a beat behind in the choreography. Strange as it might be, moments like this were about as close to being relaxed as Blaine could have during the day. He was always running from one end of the school to the other, torn between coursework and teachers and boxing and his duties as the head of his class; even the being the lead soloist of the Warblers was exhausting by the time he finished with practice, and if he were especially unlucky, the council meetings that took place right after the group practice. So if he could find a spare moment to sit down and unwind for just a second before he locked himself in his room to do his assignments, then he would take it in any way presented to him.

"Wake up, Killer," Sebastian grinned, shifting Blaine's feet away from him as he leaned over and kissed him quickly on the lips. "The meeting's about to start and Thad already looks like he's preparing a lecture on how you're mocking the sanctity of the council by sleeping on their couch."

"I'm not sleeping," Blaine muttered, but sat up anyway and propped his elbow on the arm of the couch and prepared to at least pretend to pay attention to what was sure to be another round of song selection, tie squabbles, and Wes shooting down any and all of Sebastian's inappropriate opinions in both matters. Occasionally it could be amusing and Blaine did like having some say in what songs the group would sing and since he was almost always the one under the spotlight, at least he could push for a song he liked; most of the time however, he was stuck watching Thad and Wes in a power play while Sebastian provided Blaine with whispered commentary in his ear.

"I officially call this meeting of the Dalton Academy Warblers Council to order," Wes said in a grand voice as he banged his gavel down on the desk. "Our secretary should being transcribing notes starting now as I open discussion on our first, and only, order of business today. Gentlemen, tomorrow we will be welcoming an unprecedented new member in our midst; the inexplicable Rachel Berry."

There were a few murmurs of speculation amongst a few of the members, but most of the major points of discussion had taken place the week before when they'd been informed by Headmaster Dickens himself that they were not only expected, but required, to welcome the new girl as the first ever female Warbler, and to find a suitable place for her. Thad had been outraged, proclaiming the only suitable place of a female in the Warblers was as a seamstress, which had earned them all a lecture on being of proper respect and the thin line between gender roles and sexism. It had not been one of their finer moments.

"Blaine has been assigned as her roommate," Wes explained in a bland voice, "and the council would like to ask him what his impressions of Ms. Berry might be."

Well, he hadn't expected that and he sat upright with a jolt as everyone in the room turned to look at him expectantly. They did look genuinely curious – except of course for Thad who was still enraged over the subject, and Sebastian who always looks bored whenever Wes spoke. Blaine cleared his throat and he stood up, clasping his hands behind his back as he began to speak.

"She's a nice girl," and he grinned a little, wondering exactly how she might disagree with him calling her _nice, _"maybe a little rough around the edges, but if you ask me, that's something we could use a little more of around Dalton."

"Yes, but is she a good fit for the Warblers?" Wes asked.

"If we all keep an open mind," Blaine responded with a shrug of his shoulders, "then she should have no problem fitting in with us."

"That means you Thaddeus," Sebastian quipped, earning him a glare from the Warbler in question and a round of snickers from nearly everyone else. Even Wes was fighting back a smile and Blaine took that to mean his impromptu interview was over and sat back down, slouching as far into the leather as he could and still be considered attentive. Everyone seemed to start talking at once and he lost track of the conversations almost immediately. It was David who finally got him back on track as he called his name.

"How did you end up being the one with the girl roommate?" he shouted across the room, throwing a ball of paper at Blaine's head, missing by an inch and it bounced into the floor under his feet.

"Because he's the only one gay enough to pull it off," Sebastian retorted as he leaned over and picked up the ball, throwing it back at David and hitting him in the chest. The rest of the boys laughed as David fumbled for the offending wad of paper and threw it at whoever was closest to him.

"Don't be jealous Seb," Blaine drawled, winking at his boyfriend. "If you didn't make out with everything that moves, I'm sure they would have picked you instead."

"Oh, with everything that moves, huh?" Sebastian laughed, grabbing onto Blaine's belt loops and pulling him closer, digging his hands into Blaine's hips as Blaine fought off an embarrassing wave of giggles; it was the only ticklish spot on his body, a fact Sebastian used to his advantage. "Well you're moving, I guess you qualify."

"Sebastian, don't!" Blaine chuckled, shoving at Sebastian's chest as he trapped Blaine against the back of the couch, his lips attached to Blaine's neck in less than a second. It was only after Wes pounded his gavel no less than ten times, screaming about "madness and pandemonium" that Sebastian pulled away, an entirely satisfied smirk plastered across his face and Blaine had no doubt he would find evidence of his affections later in the bathroom mirror.

The room quieted down enough that they were all startled by the door slamming against the wall as it opened, causing everyone to instantly stare in, unfortunately for her, what was now Rachel's direction. She stood in the frame, showing only the slightest bit of hesitation as she glanced over the crowd of boys before finally picking him out. She closed the door politely behind her and made her way across the room towards him, tugging at the sleeve of her navy blazer, seemingly unaware that everyone in the room was watching her. Blaine smiled to himself as he watched the other boys seem to fall apart over her. She was pretty, he thought, the way girls often were, though he had never seen anyone wear a Dalton uniform the way she did. The subtle plaid skirt was obviously a new addition, pinned a little too high and falling just past her thighs; red to match the piping in the jacket and the school emblem stitch across her chest. The blazer looked completely transformed on her, the waist taken in only to flare out at her hips. It was easy to appreciate that she looked very good, and judging by the way she walked and the playful glint in her dark eyes, he knew she was well aware of that fact.

"I didn't mean to interrupt," she said sweetly, her gazed turned to the Warblers sitting behind the long desk and Blaine's grin only widened. He recognized that voice as the same one he used to placate any kind of authority he ran into: innocent, polite. and completely false falling from her lips. "I was only looking for Blaine."

"These meetings are exclusive." There was a collective groan from the boys as Thad started what could very quickly turn into at least a fifteen minute lecture. "It is a privilege to sit in during a Warblers Council meeting and I'm just not sure that you're-."

"It's alright Thad," Wes interjected to everyone's relief. "I think we can make an exception today. It's not like we won't be making more of them in the future for Ms. Ber- I mean Rachel."

She looked a little bemused, glancing over at Blaine. "That's just his way of saying we were just talking about you," Blaine said as she moved to stand next to the couch, "and asking you to join us."

"As long as we're talking about me," she said with a little laugh. Ignoring all the empty places in the room, even the ones the other guys had cleared out for her in the hope that she might sit next to them, she instead managed to situate herself in the tiny space between Blaine and Sebastian, forcing the other boy to move down the couch and forfeit his place next to Blaine. He didn't look too thrilled about it, but shrugged towards Blaine as if to say there wasn't much they could do about it.

"We were just-" Wes faltered, a light blush in his cheeks as Rachel smiled coyly at him, "That is to say we just wanted to welcome you into the Warblers."

"Thank you," she said simply, just a hint of her normal sarcasm in her voice, which caused Blaine to chuckle next to her. She elbowed him in the ribs, much to his surprise, though no one else seemed to notice at all.

"I think this meeting should be a adjourned now," Thad said, sliding his chair backwards as he stood up. He waited for Wes to make it official before he scurried out. Half of the other Warblers followed, but a few stayed behind and looked for all intents and purposes to be mingling, though it was fairly obvious they just wanted a longer look at Rachel. He couldn't exactly blame them; she was a novelty at this school and Blaine, despite having a little extra insight as her roommate, was just as curious as the rest of them, though he liked the think he hid it better. She, one the other hand, looked absolutely uninterested as she inspected her nails.

"You sure know how to clear a room," Sebastian said next to her and she merely chuckled, flipping her hair over her shoulder and crossing her legs as she leaned into him.

"You'll find I have many contradicting talents," she said smoothly. "They might have left, but you can be sure they'll come back, and it won't be for you."

Sebastian regarded her with a haughty mix of shock and approval; he wasn't used to someone who could verbally spare with him, even if Blaine managed to get a few good words in every now and then. He seemed to study her, a small smirk playing at his lips. "With a mouth like that, I'm sure they do," Sebastian leered, his fingers playing with a lock of her hair, "pretty girl."

"And that's when I remind you," Blaine said to Sebastian, "that you're going to be late for lacrosse practice."

Sebastian glanced at his watch and swore violently. He stood up, grabbed his bag, kissed Blaine goodbye on the cheek, all in what felt like less than two seconds and left the room in a blur. Rachel looked after him, then turned back to Blaine, exclaiming, "I feel like I should have whiplash. Is he always like that?"

"That's Sebastian for you," Blaine shrugged and went back to slouching against the arm of the couch. "Here tomorrow, gone today, switching gears faster than you can keep up."

"Whatever," Rachel said, jumping up from her seat, tugging on Blaine's hand until her stood up. "You're supposed to give me a tour."

"That was yesterday actually," Blaine laughed as she marched them towards the door.

"Well I've rescheduled it for today," Rachel demanded.

Showing her around was easy enough, even if she had no interest in the building or Dalton's history. He took her around to her classes, following her schedule so she might get a feel of the halls, showed her the easiest way to get to the cafeteria from the library, the back staircase that wound around to the front entrance should she ever get lost. She seemed appreciative, but mostly asked after him: what kinds of classes he took, where he disappeared to all day, who he hung out with. He couldn't see why she she wanted to know, but obliged her by telling her about his AP courses, how being head of the Junior class could be considered the equivalent of being class president at her old school, his boxing club and the Warblers and the various clubs he would often alternate for when they needed a last minute replacement. She seemed especially concerned when he started telling her about how he was often invited to high-brow fundraisers for the school, "an example of Dalton prestige and legacy" he said, quoting the dean's favorite words of introduction.

"And you like being Dalton's one man dog and pony show?" she scoffed, eyebrows arched in disbelief.

"It's not so bad," Blaine said automatically.

"You can't really be this innocent Anderson," Rachel replied with a shake of her hair. "No one is this good on the surface without being a twisted bastard underneath. Trust me, I should know."

"Yet you've been shipped off to an all-boys school for your shining behavior," Blaine said in an easy voice so that she wouldn't take offense.

"I gave up trying to be everyone's perfect ray of sunshine," Rachel explained. "I'm a bitch, let me be a bitch."

"You're not a bitch," Blaine laughed despite himself. "You're a bit brash, but probably no more than the rest of us. The difference is you don't have a problem with showing that."

"Are you trying to tell me there's some some deep, dark part of you that hates all of this as much as I do?" Rachel countered as they circled back around the east wing of private study rooms.

"Pay attention and you just might find out," he teased.

"Good," she said with an affirmative nod, "because I'd hate to be stuck with the typical boring, uptight private school cliché for my roommate."

"Then be glad you didn't end up rooming with Wes," he remarked, then noting her confusion added, "He was the one with the gavel."

"Oh thank God," she breathed. "Does he sleep with that thing?"

"We can't get David to tell us," Blaine shrugged. They had made it back to the front entrance again; technically the end of her tour and she had already turned back towards the dorms when he reached out and grabbed her hand, leading her in the opposite direction. They passed the dining hall, where students were already filing in for dinner, a few classrooms still occupied by club meetings, and crossed over the faculty wing until the library entrance stood looming before them. Blaine pushed the door open, Rachel still trailing after him.

"We've already been in here Blaine," she protested, but he just placed a finger lightly on her lips until she fell silent under his gaze.

"If you're quiet enough, I'll show you one of my secrets," he whispered, leading her through the stacks to the very back of the library and stopped in the corner that housed old Dalton anthologies. He let go of her hand, sliding behind the rickety old shelf and began running his fingers along the wall, searching for the weak spot he knew was there, but always seemed to move to a different place. Finally he found it and pushed with both hands against it and the wall swung backwards, opening up into a tiny little room. Rachel gasped from behind him, and when he glanced back to look at her, she looked genuinely impressed. "Well come on," Blaine encouraged, holding his hand out for her to take it.

As soon as she was through, he pushed the door closed behind them and plugged in a lamp he knew was just next to his feet so they could have some light. He studied her as she walked around the room, trailing her hands along the unfinished ridges on the wall, the small table and folding chairs stacked on the floor, even pausing momentarily at a large pile of books underneath a myriad of poker chips and cards.

"Only a few of the Warblers know about this," Blaine explained when she turned to look at him. "Sebastian found it last year and since then, it's kind of become this place we can go when we need a little break. It doesn't look like anything else in Dalton and as far as we know, no one even remembers this place exists. It has electricity though, so it's on the blueprints somewhere."

"Sebastian found it, huh?" she questioned, the knowing hint in her voice just enough to cause Blaine to blush.

"We kept it between us for a little while," Blaine admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. "It was a good place to- I mean, at the time we both had roommates and it's really hard to get privacy around here, so when he found this, it just made sense to- you know."

"Hook up?" Rachel supplied, laughing even harder when his blush increased. "But then the others found out about it and you lost your only good make out spot."

"No, we just started barring the door," Blaine grinned. "Thad has to see enough of Sebastian in their room, I doubt he wants to see what he does with me."

"How very courteous of you," Rachel giggled, her hands on her hips as she stood in the center of the room. "Well I have to say, I would have never expected this of you. I'm impressed."

"You think I did this to impress you?" Blaine asked, knocking his shoulders into hers. She playfully shoved him away.

"You did," she seemed quite certain as she playfully shoved him away and they both headed back towards the closed door, "and it worked. I feel like I just met the real Blaine Anderson."

* * *

**a/n: **We realize that a girl going to an all-boys school is highly improbably, no matter how we justify it in the story, so please just suspend your imagination a little bit and work with us. Thanks again for all the kind words.

_We write, you read, you review, we write more. ~Ashley and Kira_


	3. Chapter 3

Dalton was nothing like Rachel had originally suspected it to be. The halls were filled with teenage boys who, despite their uniforms and well-bred manners, were still just teenage boys. Aside from a few, they weren't as uptight and pretentious as she had assumed, and she could admit to herself that she was pleased to be wrong.

Still, she spent the majority of her time around Blaine, and by proxy, Sebastian. The two seemed as inseparable as they could be considering Blaine's many clubs and activities and Sebastian's own schedule of lacrosse and the Warblers, not to mention the copious amount of school work everyone was handed every day. Since Rachel had no other after school activities aside from the Warblers, she often found herself finished with her homework shortly after dinner, Blaine groaning in frustration when she'd sit there and do nothing for a few hours to relax and unwind.

Sometimes Sebastian would come into their room to study, claiming that Thad's study habits were far too annoying to put up with, but Rachel suspected he just wanted to spend more time with Blaine. She'd been able to outline their relationship within her first week; how Sebastian normally wasn't into 'dating' but had made an exception for Blaine, how Blaine was drawn in by Sebastian's charm and talent even if his tendency to be an asshole made Blaine roll his eyes. They worked in a weird way, sarcasm flying between the two as Sebastian made some offhand comment that seemed to spawn an entire conversation of nothing but playful arguing, but she could see how they truly cared for one another beneath the surface.

She'd tease Blaine if he came into their room later than normal, hair completely lost of its slight hold from the gel he wore to keep it under control, enjoying the sight of Blaine squirming under her scrutiny as he blurted out lame excuses she didn't buy for a second. "Relax," she'd eventually laugh, Blaine doing so only minimally as she continued, "_someone _should take advantage of living in dorms with a boyfriend."

He would raise an eyebrow but not comment on the statement, something Rachel was glad for because she felt hopelessly ridiculous for the statement alone. She could probably have any boy in the school that she wanted, if only she turned her attention on them, but they didn't really want _her_. Sure, they leered and watched as she moved through the halls, but she was the only woman on the premises besides a few teachers, and almost none of them were even bordering on being young enough to be _considered _attractive, much less someone desirably that they could obtain. They wanted someone without putting forth the effort of running into the real world and finding someone suitable to their interests, and Rachel didn't exactly settle for anything less than the best.

So instead she watched Blaine and Sebastian interact, smiling to herself as they flirted over lunches, Sebastian tossing various food items at Blaine while he tried to finish one assignment or another last minute, as they knocked into one another and smirked during Warbler rehearsals while Wes and Thad went through various speeches that Rachel rarely listened to, how Blaine would smile at a text when he thought she was too busy on her phone that she knew came from his boyfriend.

Sebastian and her didn't spend an abundance of their free time alone together, a few moments here or there while Sebastian was waiting for Blaine, but they got along well enough. He'd usually make some snide remark that she'd immediately come up with a rebuttal for, and after a slight approving nod and a few more comments he didn't mean anything deeper by, Blaine would show up and the two would disappear off to wherever they went. She suspected the hidden room in the library, now that they both had roommates again, but short of spying on the pair she had no way of knowing for certain.

She'd attempted to ask Blaine about their relationship, but aside from a few basic answers; they'd been dating for a little over a year, shortly after Sebastian arrived at the school, they didn't see much of each other on vacations with Sebastian trotting the globe on his parents dime, their first date had come almost two months after they started sneaking into deserted corridors of the school; he hadn't told her much.

She supposed it was fair, although he had asked her why she didn't have a boyfriend and with the simple stance that her and Finn just hadn't worked out, and Puck was never anything more than a friend to her, she didn't have anything else to really go with. McKinley was large, but the population of people who acknowledged her existence was not, and half of New Directions had inter-dated since the group grew nearly twice in size. It almost never worked out, and while break ups led to incredibly heartfelt solos, it wasn't worth the agony and heartbreak of having to see someone you once cared for shoving their tongue down someone else's throat only four days later.

When he asked about Quinn, she'd actually fell backwards on her bed laughing, Blaine only waiting patiently for her to explain just what it was she found so entertaining. "I'm sorry," she had said once her giggling had subsided. "It's just- Quinn is my best friend, you know, and while we've probably done a lot more than most best friends should-"

"I seem to remember you mentioning her hand in your skirt," he interrupted dryly, a smirk on Rachel's face her nonverbal response before she continued.

"But her upbringing is incredibly strict. Catholic and republican, the whole 9 yards of 'stifle everything'. Her parents know nothing about her activities with me, and they never really liked me as it was." She shrugged as Blaine nodded, seeming to understand. "Besides, she's straight anyways."

"Except for when you're half naked on top of her?"

"Except for then," Rachel grinned, Blaine chuckling as his attention went back to his homework while Rachel lunged for her phone, texting said friend in question to let her know she missed her, something she did to almost everyone at least once a day.

For as well as she was settling into Dalton, she missed Lima and her friends from McKinley. She'd spent nearly 13 years in relative solitude, ostracized from the general population of her classmates for being too loud, too abrasive, too determined, too much of everything, and when her freshman year had come she immediately set out to work towards her goal-getting out of Ohio and into Manhattan, the sooner the better. It took a while for people to join the glee club, and even longer still for them to adjust to her and her personality, but as soon as her and Puck formed some sort of alliance, the rest followed shortly, providing her with the best people she knew for the past two years.

And now she was torn away from them, a little under two years too soon, and while she had her car she had no time that coincided with their free time to get to visit them. Daily texting with Finn and Puck wasn't the same as getting to sit between them at lunch every day while they stole half her food, near incessant texting or calling with Quinn wasn't the same as laying on the floor of her bedroom coming up with a set list for their competitions. And as the New Directions won their sectionals, the Warblers having won theirs before Rachel came into the picture, she felt like her life there had been completely evaporated, disappeared and left behind.

It was an unsettling feeling, one that she couldn't shake sometimes as she wrapped her arms around her pillow and tried to blink away tears that she knew were pointless, ones she had to keep as silent as could be because if Blaine awoke and heard her, his compassionate nature might drive her into a full blown break down.

He was too nice for his own good, sometimes, and so she'd try and focus on that instead, on how Blaine could have been an incredible dick to her and her arrival in his life, but had instead taken her in and made her as comfortable as she could be, considering the circumstances. She mused over the fact often, when the two of them were quiet later in the night as he did homework and she texted Quinn, how Blaine was genuinely a good guy who had a slightly darker side she loved to see unleashed, a complexity to him that she enjoyed getting to unravel.

She supposed it was Sebastian who brought out the more snarky aspect of him, his comments usually laced with more than their face value after he had spent time with his boyfriend, and she often laughed quietly to herself how Blaine changed behind closed doors, picking up on little things like the change of his tone when the two of them were alone. Rachel wondered briefly if Sebastian was the same, having a hard time picturing the boy be anything but what he showed the world. She had made an offhand comment about it, one day, how she didn't understand how Sebastian could ever be anything but what he was by all outward appearances, but Blaine just gave her a soft smile and said Sebastian had every ability to be just as sweet as anyone else.

Rachel wasn't entirely sure she believed him.

It wasn't until she stumbled upon the two of them, opening the door to the dorm she had been sure would be empty with Blaine free from his obligations for the evening, only to see them wrapped around one another, fully clothed and foreheads touching. They hadn't seemed to noticed her coming in, voices quiet as they talked, and she just watched for a moment until Sebastian leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on Blaine's lips, the moment suddenly so intimate and tender that she felt horrible for imposing on them, bile churning in her stomach at just how _in love _they looked with one another.

"Um, hello?" she announced, closing the door loudly behind her, and while Blaine jumped, Sebastian only held on tighter.

"Can we help?" Sebastian asked, seeming determined to not be disturbed by her presence as his hands moved lower down Blaine's back, though Rachel pretended not to notice, only shooting a raised eyebrow in their direction.

"Sorry for interrupting," she said, moving towards her desk and dropping her bag on the surface, maneuvering around them with ease. "Although I think it might have been less awkward had I walked in on one of you blowing the other," she continued with nonchalance, the image jumping to her mind before she pushed it away.

"Well, as much as I'd hate for you to miss the show," Sebastian said, grabbing her by the elbow and gently pulling her towards the door. "Maybe it's time for you to go."

"And just _where _would I go?" she huffed indigently, ripping her arm from his grip with a force that seemed to startle him, though it didn't deter him in the slightest.

"Here," he said, digging out a key from his pocket and handing it to her. "You can crash in my room. We can switch roomies for the night," he grinned, Blaine groaning as Rachel glared and handed him back the key in question.

"_Or," _she said, "you can go to your room and I can stay in mine. I think I prefer that option, if I'm being perfectly blunt."

He opened his mouth to rebuttal, but Blaine seemed to sense what was surely going to turn into a never ending back and forth and grabbed Sebastian's wrist, distracting him sufficiently from Rachel so that he'd listen. "I have a lot of homework I should get done anyways," Blaine said quietly, Rachel cheering silently in victory as she turned back to her desk to let them have their goodbye in peace.

Sebastian didn't acknowledge her as he left, their door slamming a little harder than normal as Rachel pulled out the only assignment she really had to finish, becoming so enraptured in her work that she was hardly bothered by Blaine doing the same across the room from her. Their evenings were often spent like this, working quietly side by side, but when Rachel was finished, Blaine was still pushing through, mouth set in a deep frown and fingers twiddling with the pen between them. It took her a moment to realize she was staring at him once more, something she did more than she'd like to admit to, and instead decided to fish out her phone to text Quinn to elevate any boredom before it set in.

Quinn was quick to respond, explaining about how Puckerman had just left; much to the disgust of her mother, Rachel giggling quietly at her friends implications as she asked if anything was happening between the two once more. Gossiping about boys was something natural and easy, something she couldn't exactly do with any of the boys in the school she was attending and she missed the simplicity of it, of trading who they thought was the cutest and who would be the better kissers, who had done what and with whom.

She shouldn't have been surprised when the tides turned onto her, the simple words _any boys sweep you off your feet yet? _staring at her from her phone screen. She bit her lip, running over the list of guys she even knew of in the school, before finally settling on a simple _no, the only one who's even worth talking to here is blaine. _

Quinn immediately jumped on her words, much to Rachel's dismay, questioning her further on the boy in question. _The roommate? _was quickly followed by _Well, is he cute? _and shortly thereafter a lengthier _And more importantly, is he talented? Because I know talent gets you going more than anything. _

Rachel laughed aloud at that message, Blaine shooting her a questioning glance from across the room that she waved off with a simple "Quinn," leaving him to nod in understanding before turning back to his homework, Rachel focusing on her phone once more.

It took her a moment, but the message _Yes, the roommate, and yes, he's cute-but also incredibly gay and my roommate and therefore off limits. And his talent almost rivals mine. Almost. _ was sent quickly before she could second guess herself, knowing that Quinn would find words hiding beneath the ones she'd actually said regardless of what she had sent, Rachel's eyes falling to the back of Blaine as he hunched closer into his textbook, highlighting a section from it with a look of grim determination.

While Rachel could have answered the simple text of _you need to describe him, Rachel, cute can vary from Hudson to Chang like that_ with an equally simple answer of _facebook stalk him_, she instead found herself outlining all the arguably attractive qualities Blaine possessed that she tried very hard to not focus on any other time. When she read over her message after pressing send, she realized she sounded like an incomprehensible moron practically drooling over someone completely unattainable, though Quinn was a good sport about it and only responded with _sounds like a Rachel Berry potential partner if I've ever heard of one :P_, Rachel flushing pink at the words on her screen as she denied the statement once again.

_Gay_, she texted back as a simple reminder, and this time she couldn't stifle the giggles that escaped at Quinn's response of _you or him? either way, this could potentially solve your new addiction to sexting me at all hours of the night if you took advantage of living in confined spaces with a guy you are clearly attracted to_, Blaine no longer even pretending to do his homework as he looked up and watched her convulse in laughter at the very thought.

"What on earth is so funny that you keep bursting into insane fits of laughter about?" he asked, a curious glint in his eyes that Rachel had to admit intrigued her, but she merely exited out of her messages and locked the phone as Blaine made his way over as if to read them, hiding it behind her back as she shook her head.

"Now, now, Blaine, a girls phone these days is like her journal, outlining all of her-" she squealed as he made a move to grab the phone from behind her back, standing up on her bed and leaning against the wall, laughing as he climbed to lunge for it again, a smirk playing on his features even as she tried to push him away.

"So you've got secrets, huh Berry?" he questioned, managing to grab ahold of one of her arms, though she didn't hesitate at shoving the phone in her shirt before he could get ahold of it with her free hand, a victorious smile crossing her own face at the action.

"Not gonna go in there, are you Anderson?" she teased, trying to get off the bed only for Blaine to grab her around the waist, fingers dancing on the skin that had been exposed as her shirt rose, the movements tickling her as she laughed louder, Blaine chuckling lightly as he tried to get her to give up the phone.

"I could, you know," he joked back as she tried to fight him off, both falling onto her bed with less grace than she'd like to admit, and it was with almost lightning speed that his hand ducked into the unbuttoned top of her shirt, pulling it out of her bra with a victorious laugh as she cried out in defeat, scrambling after him as he ran across the room to try and get her phone back.

"Give it back!" she demanded, Blaine shaking his head as he attempted to figure out her password, holding the phone far above her head as he failed time and time again, a frown crossing his features as he mumbled about how it should have been easier to figure out. "I swear to god, Blaine Anderson, I'll-"

"What? Glare me to death?" he asked, the smile returning easily, and she could only respond but attempting to hit him, but he caught her arm and held it tight in his own, though he seemed occupied enough on holding her still that she used her free one to knock her phone out of his hand, turning to grab it as it landed on the mess of blankets and pillows her bed had become from their antics, Blaine landing on top of her as she jumped onto her bed, the weight of him firm and heavy and for a second she forgot to breathe, even as his eyes were focused beyond her and at the phone she'd managed to secure once more. She swallowed thickly, the image of him and her pressed together for entirely different reasons racing through her mind as he chuckled about being quicker than her the next time, pushing himself off of her and straightening out his shirt before returning to his work with a heavy sigh, Rachel only able to close her eyes as one thought ran through her head.

_Maybe Quinn has a point. _

* * *

**a/n**: updates may come slower now; with ashley working on fame/infamy and kira working on and so we run, but we do promise not to put this on the back burner._  
_

___We write, you read, you review, we write more. ~Ashley and Kira_  



	4. Chapter 4

**AN: **Rating upped to M - for sexual content - for the remainder of this story; chapters will be marked for your discretion.

* * *

Blaine wasn't exactly sure when it happened, but rooming with Rachel had somehow started to feel normal. It could still be awkward if he walked in on her changing or if he forgot to knock before going into their shared bathroom, but she seemed to take it in stride and he tried to follow her lead as best he could and still feel like he was respecting her as a woman, though he knew she would have appreciated it more if he just treated her as a roommate and a friend. Though he would never be able to think of her as "one of the guys" - her incessantly girlish giggle kept him from that – he found he truly enjoyed her presence, even if it had been several years since he'd been proper friends with any girl, much less one as vibrant and demanding as Rachel.

She had the personality of someone used to getting their way, but it became quickly obvious that it wasn't out of selfishness exactly, just more that she needed things to be a certain way to function; which was fine with him if only because she gave him a much needed excuse to be just less than perfect. Inside their room, he could take off the aloof mask he wore around the halls of Dalton. He could talk to her without having to think about the words he was saying and she took a certain delight in making him swear. He could answer a question wrong and he could make the inappropriate joke and she would just smile and retaliate with one of her own. They were comfortable with each other and that helped smooth over any awkwardness that might come up.

The worst of it had been in the beginning, especially at night when Rachel would get ready for bed and saunter out of the bathroom in a loose tank top that barely covered her mid-drift, legs completely bare save for the tiny underwear she might as well have painted on for all it left to the imagination. The boxer shorts she had worn the first night had been revealing enough, but after finding her blankets kicked to the floor the next morning, he realized she had worn them for his benefit and barely a week after moving in, she was clearly over that.

"Not all of us can sleep in a parka," she had remarked when he asked her, red-faced and stuttering, about her change in attire.

"I don't," Blaine protested, tugging on the hem of his t-shirt and looking down at his long pajamas pants. "I mean, I used to just sleep in boxers but when they told me you were-."

"If you know what's good for you, you won't even finish that sentence," Rachel yelled through the toothpaste in her mouth, which she spit out before whirling around and glaring at him. "I'm not changing my life any more than I have to, so I don't expect you to change yours for me. You could sleep naked for all I care, but don't go to bed uncomfortable for my sake. You don't sleep enough as it is."

He had merely rolled his eyes and shrugged on his blazer before sitting down to print off his history report and they hurried off to the breakfast hall together, the topic completely forgotten by him until later that night when she'd undressed once again. She sat on his bed while he worked, his uniform only half off, as if she were taunting him. Still, at the end of the night, he'd put on his t-shirt and pants and tried to sleep, even as his shirt choked around his neck and his legs stuck to the sheets. He suffered through just two more weeks of this before he threw his shirt across the room in a fit of annoyance. The pants were still a bit of a problem for him, but he couldn't bring himself to get rid of those, at least not right away.

It hadn't been until, just over a month since Rachel had come to Dalton, that he gave in. It was a typical school night; he slaved away over one assignment or the other while Rachel, who always finished before he did, lounged across her bed and texted her friends back home. She had started giggling, quiet at first but she grew steadily louder, until he couldn't concentrate anymore. He hadn't been really, since she started, but it was an excuse to take a break. He'd just meant to tease her, but somehow they'd end up on her bed, wrestling over her phone, pressed tightly against each other as if they had known each other their entire lives. His hands had slipped under her shirt as he held her down, her legs had pressed into his hips as she tried to flip him over and he had the casual thought that almost any guy at school would have killed to be in his position.

They had settled down and he'd gone back to his homework, though he hadn't been able to focus. It was probably his imagination, since every time he looked over his shoulder she was absorbed in whatever text she had just gotten from Quinn, but it was like she was watching him, like he could feel her eyes on him. He gave up on his work shortly after that and disappeared into the bathroom to change for bed when it occurred to him that she had just let him crawl all over her while she had barely any clothes on; if there was any doubt that she might take offense to his own state of undress, it was gone now. She whistled when he walked out in just his boxer-briefs, and he blushed, but the tension between them dissipated as she threw a pillow at him and demanded he get over himself.

It was just natural, after that, to be at ease around her in a way he couldn't be around most people; he'd always considered Sebastian to be the rare exception. They were both fairly carefree, at least when compared to the sea of suppressed prep-school boys that Blaine hated to admit he was more like than either Sebastian or Rachel would ever be. He comforted himself by reminding him it wasn't by choice, but more of a necessity to keep his father appeased and as much out of Blaine's personal business as possible. As long as Blaine made the highest marks, did anything and everything asked of him, as long as Mr. Anderson was pleased, he didn't say anything about his son's alternative lifestyle or his participation in the crude sport of boxing. It was a bit juvenile, but his father's approval mattered to Blaine, even if it never seemed to last from one semester to the next.

"What's this I hear about you turning down an invitation to the debate club?" his father snapped without even a simple hello as Blaine answered his phone Saturday morning.

"I didn't turn it down," Blaine sighed as hurried down the hall, glancing at his watch. "I just offered to be an alternate."

"Explain to me in what world 'debate team; alternate' is better than 'debate team; captain' when read on a college application," he father huffed from his end of the line. As if he was standing right in front of him, Blaine could see his disapproving grimace, the hard set of his jaw that made Blaine feel less than an inch tall.

"I wouldn't have been captain, Dad," he said weakly, knowing it was a fuitile argument.

"No, you won't be as an alternate."

"Can we talk about this later?" Blaine pleaded. "I'm already late for Sebastian's game and-."

"You're going to be later," was his brisk response, "because I've already spoken to Professor Mitchell and told him to expect you at practice as a full fledged member of the debate team. You are to apologize to him, say you had a change of heart and I expect you to be a willing participant from now on."

"How am I supposed to fit this into my schedule?" Blaine gaped as he sagged against the wall, running a hand irritably through his hair. "Dad, I know you just want what's best for me, but I'm barely keeping up as it is between all my classes and boxing and-."

"For God's sake Blaine, don't you think it's time to give up that childish sport?" Mr. Anderson growled. "A bunch of boys playing at being men because they can punch a bag of sand for an hour. It's unfit for a gentleman and I only allowed it because you needed a physical extracurricular to be considered a well-rounded applicant but three years is more than enough to satisfy any school."

Blaine could have argued that boxing taught discipline and patience, but since his hands had curled into fists during his father's tirade, he wasn't sure it would sound convincing. "I'll work it out," Blaine promised instead, shoving his shaking fist into his pocket, "somehow. I won't give up boxing."

"I don't care," his father groaned. "Just don't complain to me how you don't have time for the important things when you waste six hours of your week in the gym, and then spend your Saturdays watching your friend play a lacrosse game."

"He's my boyfriend," Blaine corrected automatically.

"It doesn't matter Blaine. Just get to debate practice. You're late enough as it is."

His father hung up, again with no goodbye or other pleasantries, leaving Blaine standing in the empty hallway, clutching the phone tightly in his hand as he fought the urge to yell or punch the wall – or both. He managed to keep himself from lashing out at the building, but as he turned to stomp angrily towards the class where the debate team met and practiced, he didn't stop the scream that escaped the depths of his gut. The sound echoed off the high rafters in the ceiling and followed him across the school. It rattled around in his head during his practice, which he begrudgingly sat through until it was dismissed, and didn't go away until he had raced down to the lacrosse field just as the fourth quarter was starting.

"Sebastian made this amazing save at the last minute," David said as Blaine sat down next to him, searching out Sebastian in the goalie net. "You should have seen it."

"Yeah," Blaine agreed sadly, "I should have."

It would probably have been a very exciting game if Blaine had the capacity to pay attention, Instead, all he could hear was David's words about how he had missed yet another thing he hadn't meant to, something important to the people he cared about, to Sebastian, to him. He wished he knew how to be there for everything and for everyone but the more he said yes to, the harder it was to say no and the less time he had for... for just anything. Even when Dalton won and the stands erupted into cheers, Blaine couldn't seem to muster up even a false enthusiasm, just marched blank-faced down to the field to wait for Sebastian.

"Nice of you to show up," Sebastian griped, rubbing a towel through his hair to keep the sweat from dripping into his eyes. "At least you know we won."

"David said it was all thanks to you," Blaine said, hoping he at least sounded happy for Sebastian.

"Seeing as he was the one in the stands, he would know," Sebastian snapped, glaring at Blaine as he started unbuckling his shin guards.

"Seb, I'm sorry," Blaine offered, his voice tired and thin even to his own ears. "I even left early, okay? You can ask Rachel but then my dad called and-."

"And you had to go kiss the dean's ass some more, right?" Sebastian interjected, throwing his equipment down onto the bench, making it rattle. "No, I'm sorry, that's Tuesday isn't it? You had to join the jazz band."

"The debate club actually."

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Sebastian groaned. "Blaine, you turned them down already."

"I know, but my dad-."

"I don't care about your dad!"

"What do you expect me to do Sebastian?" Blaine yelled and he didn't even care that Sebastian was glaring at him or that half of the students had turned to look in their direction. "Do you even realize how lucky you are that your parents don't care what you do in school as long as you're not getting kicked out? My dad knows all my teachers and the administrators and the department heads. Hell, he even knows the maintenance team. I don't get a break when it comes to him but I try to make time for you and I'm sorry if I screw up, okay? I can't do everything."

"So stop trying!" Sebastian screamed, stepping close to Blaine and cupping his face with both hands. "Just stop, Blaine. Just tell him no. Tell him you can't."

"You don't think I've tried?" Blaine whispered harshly.

"I don't think you try hard enough," Sebastian sighed heavily, letting his hands fall away from Blaine as he retreated back to the bench to gather his gear.

"Enough," Blaine spat, the word bitter as poison on his tongue. "It's never enough, right? No matter what I do, how hard I work, it just doesn't even matter because I'm just not good enough."

"What are you talking about?" Sebastian had gone very still, the anger in his eyes replaced with concern and somehow, that only served to make things worse.

"Nothing," Blaine muttered, crossing his arms over his chest. "I'm being stupid."

"No, answer me," Sebastian demanded. "What are you talking about?"

"Everything, okay?" he said in a strangled voice. "Nothing I do is ever enough, not for my dad, and clearly not for you."

"You've got to be high or something," Sebastian scoffed. "Are you serious right now?"

"You think I don't see it?" Blaine whispered, his heart dropping to his shoes. "I see you. Every day, every time I turn around you're there, flirting with every other guy who gives you the time of day and it kills me because I can't do that for you. I know I can't, so you have to get your fill of attention or adoration or whatever it is that I can't give you from someone else. They're always there when I can't be because I have to run off to another class or club that I couldn't give a shit about."

"It's innocent Blaine," Sebastian said softly, reaching for his hand but Blaine only pulled away.

"It's not," Blaine argued, "because one day you're going to decide you like that better and you'd rather have someone you can fuck around with all day and night because he's not trying to live up to everyone's expectations. And you can't say it won't happen," he continued in a rush as Sebastian tried to protest, "because I can see it happening, okay?"

"With who?" Sebastian asked, his eyes flashing at the accusation.

"Carter," Blaine said simply. "He's hot, Seb, and he knows it. He wants you."

"Carter is a friend," Sebastian said, emphasizing the word through his teeth. "We're on the team together and we have four of the same classes."

"I was a friend, remember?" Blaine remarked, watching Sebastian pale as he shook his head. "When we started fooling around, I was just your friend and then it just changed. Overnight almost, when you came up to me at breakfast and called me your boyfriend. It's that fast with you and what happens if one of these days when Carter touches you or bats his eyes at you like he always does, you give in and the very next day, I'm sitting by myself in the dining hall because you found something better?"

"You're making things up in your head."

"I'm not!" Blaine shouted suddenly. "If it was just him, I wouldn't care, but you flirt back! Every time I have to stomach another joke about inviting him in for a threesome, you might as well be telling me I'm not good enough for you anymore and I'm sick of it Sebastian."

"Blaine," Sebastian whispered slowly, but he didn't seem to know what to say, his head slung low as he stared at his hands. Several moments passed and Blaine couldn't take the silence. He turned on his heel and walked off the field, behind the stands, and towards the building, stopping only once to spare a look over his shoulder. Sebastian was still seated on the bench, his head down; he hadn't moved at all and to Blaine, it only meant he had been right. Sebastian wanted more, and Blaine wasn't enough to give that to him. Who would run after that?

As soon as he got back to his dorm, he wished he had gone somewhere else. Rachel was at her desk, chewing on the eraser of her pencil as she hunched over a French book and while this was perfectly normal for a Saturday afternoon, Blaine was too worked up to sit quietly on his side of the room. If he wasn't so intent on avoiding Sebastian, he would have just left, no matter how strange Rachel might have thought it would be, but he was and that left him very few choices for what he could do. He turned on his laptop, but slammed it shut without opening any of his assignments. He thought he might take a shower but only got as far as taking his shirt off before flouncing down onto his bed, his legs dangling off the edge. He sat up, crossed his ankles, lay back down-

"Would you _stop?_" Rachel pleaded, turning around in her chair with a half-hearted glare.

"Sorry," Blaine muttered, jumping up from his bed and crossing the room to lean against her desk, her chair swiveling around to face him. "What are you doing?"

"Exactly what you think I'm doing," she sighed, tapping her textbook, "but the real question is what are you doing?"

He shrugged, skimming through her worksheet and smiling to himself when he realized it was perfect but she wasn't paying attention to her homework at all. Instead, she focused on him with a wry grin. "That's very informative Anderson," she said shortly, hitting him in the arm with her pencil. "Really, you've painted a lovely picture for me, I can't believe I wasn't there."

"Shut up," he muttered, but found himself telling her everything about his father, the debate team, and his fight with Sebastian. She just listened, nodding every now and then as he spilled his guts and while he wouldn't say he felt like the weight had been lifted off his shoulders, she was the only person in his life who had no expectations of him. He could trust her to be on his side, he realized as she placed her hand over his, tracing small circles into his skin. "Sorry, I didn't mean to just unload like that."

"I don't understand how you haven't had a psychotic break," she said.

"Thank you," he replied through gritted teeth. "I feel much better."

"I just mean you put yourself through so much," Rachel amended with a small chuckle, her fingers trailing up his arm, "and then you take responsibility for things you can't control. Then on top of that, you have absolutely no outlet. Me, I get to sing, but what do you do? You can't box because even that's for someone else, you can't fuck your boyfriend because you just end up worrying about whether or not he's satisfied. You need to chill out."

"Why haven't I thought of that?" He moved away from her desk and headed back to his bed, surprised when her hand clasped around his wrist. He turned to face her again and with a quick yank on his arm, she pulled him down towards her, lips crashing over his. Her mouth was hard against his, insistent and purposeful as she parted his lips, her tongue dancing against his teeth. "Rachel," he gasped, as she shoved him against the edge of his bed. "What are you doing?"

"Stop talking," she demanded and with another shove, she forced him down on his back as she crawled on top of him, her legs straddling his hips. She flipped her hair over her shoulder and brought her lips back to his once more with a brief kiss before working her way down his jaw, his bare chest. "If you want my opinion," she spoke huskily against his skin, "you should go find Sebastian and make him worry about being enough for you."

"That's," Blaine gulped as she nuzzled into his stomach, "exactly what he wants me to do."

She nodded, her lips pressed against the waistband of his jeans as her fingers unsnapped the button and in one deft movement, her hand slithered into his pants and cupped him through his boxers. This seemed to snap him back into his senses as he wriggled out of her touch, though she kept him pinned at the waist. "I have a boyfriend," he said hurriedly, "as you so kindly reminded me."

"He's not here," she huffed, hooking her fingers through his belt loops, "and you have a problem."

"I'm gay."

"I'm straight and the best orgasm I've ever had came from a girl. Trust me," she grinned slyly, one hand pulling down his jeans while the other slipped into his underwear. "Close your eyes. It won't matter whose mouth is around your dick after that."

Her hand closed around him once more and his brain seemed to shut down completely as his body responded to her touch. Firm strokes, her thumb swiping over his tip as she worked him up and down until he was inexplicably hard underneath her hand and just as he was getting used to watching her, she bent over him, her tongue flat against his base as she licked her way up, her mouth closing around him when she reached the tip once more. His head fell back on the mattress at that, his eyes closed as she instructed. Her cheeks hollowed around him the further down she went, deeper and deeper until he hit the back of her throat; her tongue darted out again, his hips bucking on their own accord.

She built up a rhythm, fast and slow, shallow and deep, and a tight coil burned low in his stomach as she continued to pull him into her mouth, little whining noises escaping her as she pushed him closer and closer to the edge. He groaned as her nails dug into his thigh and he sat up to warn her that she had gone too far, that she needed to stop but she forced all of him into her at that exact moment and he fell apart, his hips jerking erraticly as he poured into her mouth. She stayed with him, her lips tight in a seal around him, drinking him in until he collapsed back onto his bed, spent.

He felt like he was spinning and it took a few moments to collect himself. She stayed on her knees, taking deep breaths as she wiped at the corners of her mouth before disappearing into the bathroom. She emerged only a minute later, her hair smooth and perfectly back in place as she dried her hands on a towel. She smiled at him and it was a strange breed of kindness and power, of knowing, as she sat back down at her desk with her back to him once more. She picked up her pencil, studying her textbook as she chewed on the eraser innocently, as if that same mouth hadn't just sucked him off, as if he wasn't watching her tongue dart out from her lips, remembering it against his skin; as if she had no idea that somewhere in his hazy brain, he wanted her to do it again.

* * *

_ ~Ashley and Kira_


	5. Chapter 5

**warning: **chapter rated M for sexual content.

* * *

She had snapped.

That's all there was to it.

Blaine had been frustrated and upset and no one else in his life seemed to realize the stress and pressure he was constantly under, and he needed a way to relax. How that had translated to her on her knees for him, she wasn't quite sure; all she did know was that she figured her desire for him would quell afterwards and it seemed to do the exact opposite. She could still taste him, feel him in her mouth and while she was a far superior actress to most, she was afraid he could sense the fact that she wasn't moving past the incident as well as she wanted to appear.

It would have been a lot easier to deal with had Blaine not continued to freak out about it. He hadn't spoken for the rest of the night, which both worried Rachel and let her get her own work done. Blaine had simply laid there, all night, and besides getting up for a shower and ignoring a phone call - one she supposed was from Sebastian, seeing as he always took his father's calls - he didn't leave his bed.

When she came back from her afternoon in Lima on Sunday to see him still mildly panicking, she decided she'd had enough. She could see the tension in his shoulders, the same one that had been there all weekend whenever she stepped too close to him, and she wanted to scream in frustration from how he was acting. "Will you _stop_?" she practically yelled, Blaine jumping from his chair as he whirled around to face her, panic written all over his features. "You have got to stop acting like the end of days is upon us, it's going to drive me up a wall!"

"I cheated, Rachel! I did exactly what I accused Sebastian of turning around and doing to me, and I can't take it back!" Blaine retorted, and she felt guilt swirl in her stomach, but she refused to acknowledge it and let it eat her alive as much as Blaine seemed to be doing.

"And who says Sebastian didn't run off into the arms of-what did you say his name was? Connor? Collin? I don't even care-the point is, it was a blow job and you were freaking out and you needed to relax. If I had realized that even an orgasm wouldn't chill you out, I obviously wouldn't have done it."

"He wouldn't," Blaine muttered miserably, and Rachel just rolled her eyes before dropping her purse on her bed, closing in on them.

"That isn't how you felt yesterday, and I'm not going to walk around on eggshells. Do you want an apology? Fine. I'm sorry I was the only person in your life who thought you might need a break for once, but how is anyone else supposed to afford you one when you can't give it to yourself?" He looked up at her, almost looking as if he was torn between laughing and yelling, and she couldn't help the sigh of relief that escaped her as he started chuckling, turning his head away from her.

"Sorry, this isn't funny but - God you suck at apologies," Blaine commented, Rachel ignoring him as she moved towards their bathroom to shower before she could attempt sleeping for the evening.

"Sorry I sucked you off," she amended, the paling of his face her reward as she turned her back on him, a slight smirk on her face as she closed the door on him.

They didn't talk again until later that night as she sat on her bed painting her toe nails, Blaine settling in her desk chair and looking at her with a look that she knew immediately she wasn't exactly going to be too fond of. "Yes?" she asked, focusing on not getting red nail polish all over her comforter.

"You were right-maybe not your methods, but I needed to relax for a few minutes. And instead of appreciating what was clearly an unusual way to go about it, I freaked out. I apologize." She could sense the 'but' hanging off the end of his sentence but didn't say anything, waiting for it as patiently as she could, but it wasn't until she looked up at him that he finally continued, taking a deep breath and looking for all intents and purposes like he was steeling himself against one of her various break downs or screaming fits. "But it can't happen again. At all. I have a boyfriend, whom I care about very much. I don't want to jeopardize anything with him."

She wanted to remind him that it was _Sebastian_, and the most she could see him getting upset about was that he wasn't there to watch, but Blaine seemed to sense that she had a comment to say and talked over her anyways. "And we're not only roommates, but I'd like to think we're friends now too. And I don't want that to change either."

"Relax," she repeated for what felt like the nineteenth time. "It won't happen again. It's not like I'm going to tie you to your bed and have my way with you or anything," she told him with an air of nonchalance she clearly didn't feel as the image danced inside her head, taunting her and it seemed to do the same to Blaine as his eyes glazed over for a moment, his Adam's apple bobbing when he gulped for fresh air. "We can just pretend nothing ever happened if it means you'll calm down again."

"Great," Blaine agreed, though his voice wasn't as strong as it had been and it took him a minute or two before he departed to take his own shower, Rachel refusing to look at him as she finished her nails with a heavy sigh.

"Great," she repeated quietly to herself when the room was empty, falling back onto her bed and mentally kicking herself for probably ruining the only relationship she could really tolerate at the school.

-:-

Things evened out after a couple days, Blaine and Sebastian once more back to portraying the golden couple on campus while Rachel became even quieter in their presence. It wasn't that she was jealous of Sebastian, per say, but more so that she was starting to pick up on the cracks in their relationship and wasn't sure if she liked what she saw. Sometimes Sebastian's comments would hit a little too deep, and she could see when Blaine's smile went from real to fake and how it hurt him, and she wondered if Sebastian could see it as well.

She watched as Carter came up to Sebastian, flirting blatantly while Blaine ducked his head to work on homework, how Sebastian leaned into Carters touches a little too often, and she decided she didn't like it. She felt protective, almost, of Blaine now and she didn't want Sebastian to screw him over in the long run. Blaine had enough to deal with without adding a cheating boyfriend in the mix, and Rachel very nearly snapped her opinion at Sebastian whenever they found themselves left alone together.

He came up to her one afternoon when she was working in the cafeteria, too lazy to move between her classes and dinner as she studied intently for her upcoming French test, sliding onto the booth across from her and waiting patiently until she put her textbook down to stare at him.

"You don't seem to like me these days," Sebastian commented as he sat down, Rachel shrugging without really answering as she scribbled down a translation she needed in her notebook. "Any particular reason why?"

She looked up at him again, hesitating between the truth and a lie, before deciding to settle somewhere in between. "You're kind of a dick," she finally said, her voice lacking any real emotion to it as if she was telling him the time or the weather forecast.

"And you're kind of a bitch," Sebastian replied, just as simply, and it wasn't a statement she'd deny so she simply nodded in response before attempting to go back to her homework. "So we have two things in common. Our general disdain of the human race, including each other; and the fact that one of the only people we can tolerate is Blaine."

"What a beautiful sentiment about your boyfriend," she deadpanned, not bothering to look up, "you should have it engraved on a ring for him."

"Thanks, I was thinking silver," Sebastian retorted, finally earning Rachel's full attention as she closed her books and looked up at him once more.

"What do you want, Sebastian? I have a big test I'm trying to study for," she said wearily, motioning to the various books she had spread across the table.

"Please, even if you failed you could have your dads in here buying another library for the school to pass you anyways. Isn't that how you got in here in the first place?" She glared at him, her distaste for him growing the longer he kept opening his mouth, and he seemed to sense her waning patience for him as he cleared his throat and looked around, as if he didn't want anyone to overhear their conversation. "As lovely as the banter has been, I didn't come over here to bother you."

"Then I'll have to ask, once more, what the hell you want," she replied, officially losing all patience for him even as his face fell into what would have been a sincere look on anyone else, but Rachel was certain was just another one of his masks he wore.

"Has Blaine been…weird, at all? Lately?" Sebastian inquired in a hushed tone, Rachel's eyes widening slightly in surprise, and she wasn't exactly sure how to respond to the question before Sebastian pushed on without an answer anyways. "He's been quieter than normal lately, and under regular conditions I'd ask him but he blew up at me and it almost feels like we're on thin ice, and you're his roommate, so you see him the most."

"He's just stressed, Seb," Rachel informed him, though she didn't think that was the entire truth. "Schoolwork is starting to pile up with midterms coming, and you know as well as I do that he has probably a hundred different clubs he participates in every afternoon, not to mention trying to give you attention and occasionally even sleep."

Sebastian stayed quiet after she finished, and she had flipped open her textbook once more, assuming they were done when he startled her with a simple question of "Can you just watch over him?"

"I hope you don't mean literally because that seems a tad creepy," she replied, Sebastian smirking in response as their normal repertoire seemed to fall back into place.

"I'm going away to Paris for a week, under the illusion of visiting family but I really just can't fucking stand to be around here for an entire semester without taking at least one vacation, and I don't want him exploding under all the pressure of everything," Sebastian informed her, and she nodded hesitantly.

"I'll make sure he's fine," she promised, thinking silently that she probably had a better chance at doing so than Sebastian did in the first place.

"I'll even bring you back something pretty for your efforts," Sebastian winked, "keep out of trouble pretty girl," he called as he walked away, Rachel shaking her head as she let out a chuckle, wondering how it was that he always seemed to get people charmed enough to do his bidding when they were supposedly annoyed with them, but she knew it was pointless to look further into it when Sebastian had given her instructions to look over Blaine, something she would have done with or without Sebastian's blessing; something she hated to admit to herself she almost saw as an invitation.

-:-

She had assumed Sebastian's disappearance for awhile would relax Blaine some, but of course it hadn't a bit. He was just as tense as ever, and it was starting to stress Rachel out just being around him. She took advantage of the few moments she had alone when he was off somewhere studying or at some various event; while an orgasm certainly hadn't improved him any she knew that it would certainly benefit herself, though she was always careful to make sure she had plenty of time before Blaine came back. The last thing she wanted was for him to think she was trying to trap him somehow, because if he wanted to be nothing more than friends she'd settle for it.

The third night Sebastian was gone, Blaine had disappeared to some black tie dinner or another to be paraded around as Dalton's golden boy once more, Rachel relaxing in the dark of their room as she tried to will away a headache. She hadn't even bothered getting under the covers, laying on top of them in a teeshirt she was pretty sure was actually Blaine's that had somehow managed to find its way into her pile of clean laundry, staying quiet even as he came into the room.

He grumbled quietly at the darkness, moving towards the middle of the room and taking her in as she made sure her eyes appeared mostly closed, though she could still see his outline in the darkness as he called her name softly. "Rachel? It's only 10pm, you can't possibly be asleep," he whispered, coming just short of actually reaching out to shake her into an awake state before he gave up, seeming to accept that she had crashed early in his absence.

As he turned his back to her, she opened her eyes once more and watched as he threw his blazer towards his desk, loosening his tie as he kicked off his shoes and she could practically feel the stress radiating off of him, even in the dark. His shoulders were tense once more, his entire body seemed as if it was coiled tight and ready to combust, and she wondered when exactly she'd been able to read him so well, especially in the near blackness of their room, the only light coming from their window by his bed.

He puttered about, not bothering to turn on a light as a courtesy to her, she knew, slowly stripping out of his clothing, and she chewed on her lip as she watched-she knew she should have closed her eyes, actually fallen asleep, or at least let him know that she was still awake, but she reasoned that she'd seen him in various states of undress over the past month and a half, that if he were to even glance in her direction he'd see her in a near naked state as well, having given up bothering to wear shorts to bed so long ago. But there was something different, she supposed, from happening to glance at your roommate as they got into bed and purposely watching as he unbuttoned his shirt and threw it in the direction of his laundry hamper, as he slid out of the trousers he wore day in and day out and put his belt on the top of his dresser before climbing into bed.

She closed her own eyes, figuring Blaine would soon settle into the light breathing that would occasionally lull her to her own sleep when she was up too late studying for something, but he only seemed to toss and turn from his bed, Rachel growing irritated at the havoc he was creating on his side of the room. She turned over on her side, facing him and ready to say something-what, she wasn't sure-when his motions halted, Rachel content that he was going to sleep finally.

Instead, her eyes flew open as she heard him rustle around once more, ready to tell him off and to knock it off when she focused in on his hand moving slowly down his stomach, his lip between his teeth as it slid inside his boxer briefs, and her breath seemed to catch in her throat as she realized what he was doing. She didn't think he did this when she was actually around very often, but suddenly the thought that maybe he had been, once he was convinced she was asleep, coursed through her body and seemed to cause her to flush even in the darkness.

Rachel watched as he palmed himself briefly before he pushed his briefs out of the way, his erection springing free as he reached over for the lotion on his bedside table to moisten his hand slightly before he began to stroke himself, slowly and deliberately, and Rachel was reminded of when it had been her own hand on his dick, her tongue and her mouth and she was overwhelmed with the sensation to repeat their acts though she stayed silently where she was. She could feel her own body react to the sight in front of her, her thighs squeezing tightly together to try and control some of the desire she felt, because she couldn't risk moving her hand from its spot under her pillow. She didn't want him to realize she was watching, knew it was creepy to say the least, but she couldn't seem to stop herself.

She figured he was thinking about Sebastian, which frankly almost dampened her own arousal before she started thinking about him thinking about her, and she wondered if he had in the days since she'd practically forced herself on him. She wondered if he was picturing her hand wrapped around him instead of his own, her tongue pressed flat against his shaft as she dragged it slowly across it, her mouth suctioning around the head of him as he came and she swallowed every last bit-something she'd never even had a desire to do before, but couldn't help but want to do again with him. She tentatively moved her hand underneath her pillow down to her breast, squeezing it lightly through the fabric of her shirt-_his_ shirt, she thought, chewing harder on her lip to keep herself silent as she pressed her thighs even tighter together, Blaine's breath hitching from his bed as his pace quickened.

He was good at keeping quiet, she noted, and she suddenly had the desire to never actually fall asleep first again lest she miss out on this, the slick noise of his hand moving up and down keeping her eyes wide and she traveled from the obvious place up to his face, his tongue poking out slightly as he breathed heavily, and she could tell from their one small experience that he was getting close. She was torn between watching his eyes roll back and his hips jerk up as he started to come, her decision to watch as he shot up towards his stomach and over his hand only distracted when he let out a choked moan and a simple call of a name.

_Her _name.

She barely suppressed a shudder as he said it again, quieter, "Rachel," trying to decide if she should lock herself in the bathroom and call Quinn to talk her over an edge quickly or do exactly as he had done and go ahead and masturbate right there when he turned his head and locked eyes with her, his hand still wrapped around his now deflating cock. He seemed to panic for a moment once he realized that her eyes were open and that she had watched him, a small "Rachel?" completely unlike the one that had just rolled off his tongue only moments before escaping him, but she only smiled before turning away from him, deciding she'd wait until he was actually asleep before acting on anything.

When she got up to hide herself away in their bathroom an hour later, phone hidden away in her hand, she could see that Blaine was still awake, staring up at the ceiling with a grimace on his face.

* * *

_~Ashley and Kira_


	6. Chapter 6

**warning: **chapter rated M for sexual content.

* * *

Going to an all boys school meant you spent a lot of time with your dick in your hand, leering over privately stashed Playboys or whatever you could come up with to get you going and frankly, just because Blaine was gay didn't mean he spent less time at it than the rest of his classmates. Sometimes it was almost worse to be surrounded by the things you wanted but could never have. With Sebastian gone, the itch bit back with a vengeance and once he got to that place, his mind tended to take over and there was no way to control the things he might have been thinking about. His body just reacted, he rationalized and that was the only reason the lingering image of Rachel on her knees with him buried deep in her throat was the latest cause of his undoing.

The truth was, Blaine couldn't honestly figure out why it had happened that way. It had started normally enough as he envisioned Sebastian and his long, lean body wrapping around him; his hands digging into the turn of his hips as his teeth grazed harshly against that one spot on Blaine's collarbone that made his knees buckle every time they were together. But when he actually closed his eyes and let it all take over, it wasn't his boyfriend's legs he pictured. Instead he was overwhelmed with images of soft pink lips and silky brunette hair and the decidedly feminine curve of shoulders and breasts to hips and calves. She was burned into his brain along with the feel of her tongue against his skin and the desperate whimper she'd made when he came for her; in his imagination, she begged for him.

Rachel didn't beg, he knew that, and he had never gotten much out of it himself, but there was just something about the way she absolutely _wanted him_ in this fantasy that flipped everything on it's head and he couldn't keep her name from his lips as he gave into it. A pleasant buzz washed over him, almost as hot and sticky as the mess he'd made of his stomach and it only went away when his gaze drifted lazily over to where Rachel was sleeping, traveling up her bare legs and tracing the smooth lines of her figure until he found himself staring into her unblinking eyes, the night shining in their depths as she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth; it was then he knew she had seen him, had even heard him.

The primal half of him that wasn't drowning in embarrassment had tried to drag him over to her bed and find out if her real life counterpart wanted him as much as she had in his mind, but reality seemed to slap him in the face and he didn't dare move from his spot until she disappeared into the bathroom an hour later. He cleaned up as best he could and made sure to be facing the wall when she finally came out, climbing into her own bed and falling asleep with an ease he envied her for. It was hours before he finally fell into his own fitful sleep and in the morning, when he did manage to roll out of bed, taking the sheets with him, she had gone without a word.

The guilt had come later during his psychology elective when his mind wandered away from the lecture and the first conscious thought he could pick out of his muddled brain was that of Rachel watching him as she had done the night before. Only her hands weren't stilled under her pillow, but one clutching at her breasts as her back arched and lifted off the bed, her remaining hand hidden under the waistband of her skirt. Her mouth fell open as if to say something and then David dropped a book next to him and Blaine was back in the classroom and way too turned on and no logical explanation for it. He spent the last thirty minutes solving equations in his head while trying to convince himself that the only reason any of this was happening was because he just missed his boyfriend and as soon as Sebastian got back, all these images of his roommate in compromising situations would disappear.

He would just have to ignore those parts of her until then.

-:-

She was torturing him. On purpose and maliciously, as if she somehow knew he was trying to keep from noticing anything remotely sexual about her. It should have been easy, since he was gay and since when did he really notice things like curves and slim waists and the way those things somehow looked even better under short skirts and thin t-shirts. He'd spent the majority of his life practically immune to the things straight boys drooled over, and now it was nearly impossible to even look at Rachel without becoming enticed. It always started with her mouth and he was just now realizing the problem she seemed to have with oral fixation. She was always nipping at the caps of her pens or biting on her lip and when she ate, she cleaned her fingers with her tongue, slipping around and sucking the tips before she excused herself to wash in the bathroom. And she always seemed to catch him staring and she would smile – it was driving him crazy.

He ended up spending a lot of time in one of the study rooms just for an excuse to spend more time away from her, and she didn't question it. As far as she was concerned, there wasn't anything unusual going on; they had talked out everything that needed to be talked about and bringing up the fact that he'd called out her name seemed of little consequence to her, like it happened to her all the time. For all he really knew about her, it did. Even her best friend who considered herself to be straight was inclined to give into Rachel on more than one occasion. Blaine's crisis over this whole situation could be just another day in the life of Rachel Berry.

This was enough to simmer him down for a few days, though he should have known better than to trust that to stay away. The littlest things about her would set him off, and when he walked in the room to see her curled up on her side across the bed in just a towel, he really stood no chance at all. He froze in the doorway, his bag half off his shoulder and he was sure that if she bothered to even acknowledge his presence, she would have choked herself with laughter over the dumbstruck look he could feel on his face. Instead, she didn't seem to notice he had come in she was so engrossed in whispering quickly into the little pink phone she had clutched against her ear. He made sure to close the door silently and there was a pause as she listened to whoever was on the other end before she let out a breathy giggle.

"Quinn," she gasped quietly, a slight flush to her cheek, "that's really naughty."

He leaned against the door, his hand still lingering on the handle as he wondered if he should just leave her in peace when she said, "no, I like it a little rough; I can make you like it too." A knot rose in Blaine's throat and she moved the phone to cushion it between the bed and her other ear, freeing her hand to skim across her stomach and slip between the folds of the towel, and a soft moan filled the room as she palmed her breast. He couldn't see what she was doing to herself, but moans continued to fall as her hand moved under the loose towel. His tongue flickered out to wet his lips every time she hummed an incomprehensible word of encouragement to Quinn.

"You're just teasing now," she groaned and her legs clenched, rubbing together in an all too familiar need for some kind of friction. She extracted her hand from her chest and it curled under the edge of the towel, her nails scraping lightly at the supple flesh of her upper thigh. "You're so good with your hands, baby, why won't you touch me?"

It was akin to a siren call and Blaine followed it out to sea, taking off his jacket before he lifted himself onto her bed. She started a bit, her breath hitching in her chest, but he merely pressed a finger to his lips and when he was sure she would stay quiet, he leaned over her and pulled the phone from it's resting spot, putting Quinn on speaker. "Do you deserve to be touched?" the other girl was asking, her voice sultry. "You're the one who left after all. Shouldn't you be making this up to me? You know how much I love having you between my legs."

"Oh God," Rachel whimpered, whether in response to Quinn or to the fact that he was currently running his hands dangerously high on the inside of her thighs, he wasn't sure. He could feel the heat radiating from her and her back arched to his touch, just like she had in his mind's eye, and he couldn't help from slipping a hand under the towel and running a finger through the downy curls he found there. "Please," she whispered and he was oddly pleased to hear that she did beg after all. "I need you."

He could hear Quinn let out a sigh on her end of the phone, but whatever she was saying wasn't nearly as important as Rachel's gaze locked into his, eyes so dark and overflowing with an abundance of pure lust. Tiny whimpers escaped her, little gasps for air, desperate and seeking him out as his touch ghosted over her slit; she was wet against his fingertips. She wanted this and he was so drawn into this whole surreal situation that he wanted to give it to her, so when Quinn let out a soft "fuck Rachel, I wish it could be my fingers sliding into you right now," almost as if she were directing him, he slowly and carefully slid one finger inside her with ease.

Rachel gasped quietly, almost in relief and her legs fell open to further let him in and he could barely even hear Quinn as she talked about moving inside of Rachel, her fingers crooking just enough to curl up and hit that spot that made Rachel shake and quiver under her touch. Except it was his touch, and Rachel was clawing at the mattress underneath her, driving herself down on his hand to match his pace as if she needed more. He was used to this with Sebastian, who always ended up being the one in control, but he wanted to be the one who called the shots in this. He shifted onto his knees until he hovered over her and with his free hand, held her hips down until she couldn't move and just as she might have protested, he slid a second finger inside her, burying himself into her knuckle deep.

"Oh fuck!" she cried, her knees coming up around him as she tried to pull him in even further. "Again, please. Harder." He pulled his fingers out before slamming them back home, over and over again until her toes curled and the towel fell away from her completely, leaving her completely exposed to him a way he had never thought about once, even in all his fantasies of her. Her breasts seemed to have swollen, tipped hard and he didn't think twice as he took one into his mouth, his tongue working in time with his fingers as he plunged into her, listening to her murmurs as they turned to half-strangled screams. She clasped his hand on her waist, moving it down to where he worked inside of her and pressed his thumb against what he discovered must be her clit, as she rocked into him even more every time he came near it.

"Yes, there," she breathed as he circled around it with the thumb from the hand that was still inside her, his other back to holding her down against the bed. Quinn said something and Rachel whined magnificently. "Almost there," she panted and he wanted her to come. He wanted to push her over that edge and watch her fall apart and he wanted to know that he did it. Her words from earlier flashed through his mind and he bit down on her nipple, teeth harsh against her skin, as he crooked her fingers inside her and kept moving, his thumb pressed down squarely on her clit until she really did start to shake. He could feel her clamp down around his hand, and he pushed further in. Her hips broke free and rose to meet his fingers, and she began to unravel. She almost stopped breathing, her moans loud and out of control, and she was just _so tight _around him that he thought she might shatter into a thousand pieces if she didn't let up soon. But then her legs went slack and her chest rose and fell with the frantic pace of someone trying to catch their breathe and she grinned at him blissfully as he slid his fingers out of her for the last time.

"That sounded like a good one," Quinn said with a laugh.

Rachel nodded, then seemed to remember that she wasn't supposed to be answering Blaine, but Quinn and choked out "you have no idea" as she stared up at him. He could see it in her eyes that she was satisfied, that he had surprised her maybe, but nothing beat the way her eyes glazed over as he lifted his wet fingers to his mouth, sucking her taste from his skin. It was second nature to him, cleaning up this way; it was what he did every time Sebastian came all over his hand and he hadn't thought it might be different, smooth and usually sweet instead of the salt that he was used to.

"Are you okay?" Rachel asked, into the phone, but it was directed to him he knew. He let an easy smile slip onto his face as he slid off her bed, his fingertip still in his mouth as he rolled her around on his tongue. He nodded and he saw her smile back before he disappeared into the bathroom. He knew later it would all catch up to him, the fact that he had broken their tentative pact to go back to normal, that he had cheated – willingly this time – on his boyfriend, but right now, all he was capable of handling was a cold shower.

-:-

Rachel was gone again by the time he woke up, but he did manage to find her at breakfast and they sat together like they normally did, but she was the one who was a little less talkative, a little more cautious around him instead of the other way around. For the first time it occurred to him, now that the moment had passed them by, that maybe Rachel hadn't wanted it after all. She had allowed it to happen, like he had allowed their first encounter, but maybe she was regretting now. It wasn't a good feeling, and he could finally appreciate why she had been so agitated when he was the one sulking around.

He might have asked her about it if the fire alarm hadn't sounded and they had to flee the dining hall for a randomized drill and he didn't have any classes with her in the mornings. By lunch, if he had even remembered the question, she seemed more like herself, laughing and smiling as she told him about the disaster Wes had made of their chemistry experiment. Still, there was a shadow of a doubt lurking in Blaine's mind as they said an awkward goodbye and went their separate ways until Warbler practice later that afternoon.

Blaine's phone rang just before sixth block. Normally he would have ignored it, claiming he was already in class when he eventually returned the call, but SEBASTIAN blinked at him accusingly from the caller ID screen and he immediately stopped worrying about Rachel and began to panic.

"Hey," he answered, stepping into a supply closet to avoid the crowds. "I didn't expect to hear from you while you were gone."

"'Sup Killer?" Sebastian greeted, speaking very quickly. "There's been a change of plans. Grandmother is sick, so we have to stay in Paris for another week. She's acting like she could die in the next instant, but the truth is she drank too much wine and fell down the stairs. The problem is, she broke her leg so she's in pain and like the life-long alcoholic she is, she drank more wine to get rid of the pain, and she's a paranoid drunk and dear old dad doesn't want to leave her on her own until he can hire a personal nurse."

"So you're all staying?" Blaine questioned.

"I tried to convince them to charter a jet, but," Sebastian paused and there was a muffled laugh from somewhere in the distance, followed by a quiet shush, "it's another week I get to stay in Paris, so long as I sneak out early and come back late."

"If you come back at all," Blaine muttered, though Sebastian had clearly heard him and demanded an explanation. "I'm just saying, you're always making friends."

"I'm a sociable guy," he agreed with a chuckle. "Look, I know this sucks. I miss you too, but don't worry. I'll be back soon, I promise. For you, I will come back. Besides, it can't be too bad, you have that pretty little roommate there to entertain you."

"Rachel?" Blaine choked on her name and it was like all the guilt he had pushed aside during the day ratcheted up a thousand or so notches. What was he even supposed to say about her? Was he supposed to say that they weren't really hanging out as much because they had done everything but fuck each other and now it was as awkward as running into a one-night stand on a constant basis? Obviously not, but it didn't leave him with too many options when it came to talking to Sebastian.

"Yeah, how is pretty girl?" he inquired, but he sounded distracted somehow, which worked in Blaine's favor as Sebastian didn't notice the way Blaine hesitated to say anything. If he had been paying attention, he would have realized that Blaine stammered when he said Rachel was fine, but no, his boyfriend was too busy yelling at someone: "No, Rafe, I swear to Christ, I am going to punch you in the neck."

"Who the fuck is Rafe?" Blaine spat out suddenly, his anger enough to drown the guilt, though Sebastian seemed oblivious to that as well.

"Just one of those new friends I'm so good at making," Sebastian said flippantly. "Babe, I have to go or he's going to break my grandmother's generations old chandelier. I'll see you next week, okay?"

"Okay, I lo-" and there was a click and the monotonous trill of a dial tone, "love you." Blaine sighed heavily as he hung up the phone, feeling further away from Sebastian that he ever had in all the time they'd know each other. Even on all the other vacations Sebastian would spontaneously take, half a world away didn't feel as far as it did right now. The miles and distance, he could take; it was the fact that Sebastian didn't stay on the phone long enough to say goodbye, that he was gallivanting around with some asshole named Rafe, laughing at his jokes when he couldn't be bothered to have a real conversation with Blaine, no matter how much he might miss him.

It was just another crack, something Blaine could see but had no idea how to fix, and he couldn't even be sure that it wasn't his fault to begin with. Maybe Sebastian had always been this way and it was just Blaine looking for a reason to be angry so that his thing with Rachel didn't feel like such a betrayal. Maybe he was looking for a reason to punish himself, by creating reasons he didn't deserve to have Sebastian in his life, that the problem was Blaine instead. Maybe he was fucked regardless.

He couldn't bring himself to go back to classes, and instead trudged to his room, falling on Rachel's bed as soon as the door slammed shut. It was an old habit from when he lived alone, collapsing on the spare bed just because it was closest to the door. But now it smelled like her, of chai tea and lavender, and his stomach rolled like he might be sick. The irony wasn't lost on him at all, as he was seeking out comfort in the one thing that most of his anxieties stemmed from, but it was so achingly familiar at this point, it was better than wallowing in nothing on his own. It wouldn't help, not in the long run, but he didn't need it to help, he just needed a moment of peace where he could try to work things out on his own before he broke down completely.

Something would have to give, and soon.

* * *

**AN: **_Sorry that it's taken so long and the next part may take awhile too but bear with us we are trying we just lead lives? Also, Ashley feels like her writing is broken, and since has the next chapter, she said to warn you about that._

_~Ashley and Kira_


	7. Chapter 7

**warning: **chapter rated M for sexual content.

* * *

Rachel had never been more confused in her life.

'Confused' was not a normal reaction for Rachel in the first place. She knew what she wanted, she knew how to get it, and she did whatever it took to get it.

But things with Blaine were messing with her mind, and after her last class of the day in the middle of the week she made the impromptu decision to skip out on Warblers' practice, heading back to Lima to see Quinn and ask for her advice. She was the only one Rachel could really, honestly trust and she deeply missed her friends from back home, even if she still got to talk to them on a frequent basis.

Rachel arrived at McKinley just as the Cheerios were wrapping up for the evening, a snarky Santana smirking at her while Brittany asked if she was done at the boys school, to which Rachel could only respond with a sad 'no'.

"Missed me enough to drive two hours, Berry?" Quinn asked when she spotted her, still sporting her cheerleading uniform and her gorgeous blonde locks tucked back in a tight ponytail.

"Of course, Fabray," Rachel grinned in return as Quinn linked their arms together.

"I knew it was only a matter of time after the other night," Quinn joked, Rachel letting out a laugh - a real one, not a stifled, quiet one like she always felt she gave at Dalton.

"Don't be so cocky," Rachel finally retorted as they made it to her car. "Do you honestly believe that was just you?"

"I'm offended," Quinn shot back, though her eyes were glinting with a smile. "Are you saying that I _wasn't _the one who made you come that hard?"

"Blaine may have helped?" Rachel offered, and Quinn merely raised an eyebrow and shook her head.

"And suddenly I feel the real reason you're here has arrived." Rachel nodded, the humor disappearing quickly between them as Quinn frowned slightly. "Follow me to my house, okay?"

"Okay," she said quietly, Quinn wrapping her up in a small hug before disappearing off to the car her dad had bought her before running off with a girl barely older than the pair of them.

She knew that this was why she had come to Quinn, because Quinn would know with only a few succinct statements exactly what Rachel needed clarified. Her own emotions were running wild, in a way they never had before. She supposed it was the closed in quarters; how close she was to Blaine at all hours of the day. In public school, she reasoned, you had only a few hours with the person you liked at most. When you boarded at an all-boys school, you had nowhere to run. Eventually, he'd be there.

"My mom shouldn't be home tonight," Quinn told her as she let them both into her house a few minutes later, "my father came back into town and she's started living at the dive bars on the edge of town to soak her sorrows in gin."

"I take it that's why you've started shacking up with Puckerman again?" Rachel teased lightly, knowing that the subject wouldn't have been brought up to anyone but Rachel.

"Naturally. A girl has to keep herself occupied," Quinn grinned over her shoulder as Rachel ditched her purse on the tile floor, following the blonde into the kitchen. "Though, you apparently seem to know all about that."

"I may have acted upon my attraction," Rachel shrugged, trying for nonchalance but Quinn's hazel eyes bore into her own and with a heavy sigh, she let it all out.

She told her about the first incident, when she'd told Blaine he just needed to relax without repercussion as an excuse to test her limits with him, how she hadn't expected anything past that until he started jacking off and saying her name when he came, but she was still planning on behaving. How it wasn't until he walked in on her on the phone that she got really confused. She hadn't intended on stopping, of course, but he hadn't seemed inclined to make her.

"And he just fingered you?" Quinn asked with a raised eyebrow, and Rachel shrugged.

"More or less," she agreed.

"And then disappeared."

"And we haven't talked about it since."

Quinn hummed quietly, leaning across the counter from Rachel as she refilled their soda's-Rachel would have asked for something stronger, but she knew she'd have to wake up incredibly early just to get back to Dalton in the morning-clearly deep in thought about Rachel's situation.

"Have you told him you like him?" she asked quietly, Rachel glaring at her friend immediately.

"I don't like him."

"Rach," Quinn said softly, a smile on her face.

"I don't! He's-" she tried to think of a negative term to describe him, flustered when she couldn't come up with anything that sounded truly convincing. "He's gay. _And _taken," she finally landed on, hoping it would be sufficient enough to shut the blonde up.

"No offense, Rachel, but he doesn't really seem to be acting like it. If he's allowing you to touch him and then touching you without provocation, he's attracted to you at the very least. And if he's willing to put what he has with - what's the douche's name?"

"Sebastian," Rachel smiled, fighting off a giggle.

"Yeah, if he's willing to put his relationship with _Sebastian_ on the line to fuck around with you, I'm willing to bet there's more than just a basic sexual attraction there."

"I don't know, Quinn," Rachel said quietly, dragging her finger through the water condensation left over from her glass on the countertop.

"I never thought I'd hear of a day when Rachel Berry didn't know something," Quinn joked, eliciting another small laugh from Rachel which had more than likely been her intention, and Rachel just looked up at her friend. "Come on, let's go watch _An Affair To Remember _and moan about how guys can't be as classically charming as they were back in the olden days," Quinn said, holding out her hand until Rachel grabbed onto it, a more genuine smile on her face.

"Sounds like the perfect, girly night to me."

-:-

They had fallen asleep, tangled up in Quinn's bed as a mess of limbs after several movies and a couple of margaritas because fduck it, we deserve them," and Rachel nearly missed her alarm to wake up and travel the two hour drive back to Dalton in time for first period.

She sped around Quinn's house, showering and throwing her hair in a lopsided bun while putting her uniform on as she traveled down the stairs; she'd send a text to Quinn later explaining her hasty departure but she knew Quinn would understand regardless.

Rachel had never driven so fast in her life, managing to pull into the Dalton parking lot with 20 minutes to spare before her first class, relieved as she pulled out her bag and headed inside, only to be stopped by a cold tone of "Ms. Rachel Berry."

She spun around only to be face to face with Headmaster Dickens, her face falling slightly as she mentally breathed a sigh of relief that she had showered before arriving back at Dalton. "Yes, headmaster?" she asked as nicely and politely as she could.

"Come with me please."

She followed him silently into his office, running through the possibilities of what she was in trouble for now-surely it couldn't have been anything having to do with Blaine, because he wouldn't risk anyone finding out but she was brought back down to earth by his statement of "Boarding students aren't to leave the premises overnight during the week, Ms. Berry."

"What?"

"According to the Dalton handbook, a copy of which you were supposed to have read and according to this slip of paper-" he held up one of the many things Rachel had signed back when her transfer went through-"that you signed and dated, you _did _read; students who live on campus are not allowed to spend the night elsewhere unless they have written permission from their parents. And since your fathers are reportedly in San Francisco for the week, something tells me that is not where you were."

"I was at a friends," she told him deciding to go with as much honesty as she could. "I'm surrounded by guys 24/7, and I wanted a break. I spent the night with Quinn Fabray, and her mother was present the entire time, and we didn't do anything but watch movies and sleep."

"While that story will be investigated upon, the fact of the matter is that you broke school rules. You were explicitly told that you would have eyes and ears on you at all times, Ms. Berry, and that we're bending a lot of our traditions to allow you a place at this school. Because you've had good behavior until this moment, the most disciplinary action we'll take is a detention after school, but let it be stated-if you mess up again, we won't be as kind."

Rachel nodded, shame and embarrassment washing over her as she asked if she could be dismissed. The headmaster waved her on, and Rachel walked numbly through the halls. She had walked through the main corridor every other day, and while her hair was normally straightened or curled and not thrown in a messy bun, that was the only thing that had been different in her appearance that morning. Which meant someone had tipped off an authority figure that Rachel hadn't been around the previous night, and the name jumped out at her immediately.

Blaine.

Blaine had _told _on her.

Just like the cowardly, upstanding citizen he tried to show off to the world, he had ratted her out when she had tried to escape for a few hours of normalcy in her life, and now she was in trouble because she was too damn sick of being around guys all the time.

It wasn't nearly as fun as every teenage girl would imagine, after all.

She slammed open their door once she reached it, Blaine appearing from their shared bathroom half-dressed, button down still hanging open and only wearing his boxer briefs as she storms over to him and slapped him, hard, leaving him with nothing more than a red hand print on his face and a stunned expression.

"You are a jackass," she hissed, her finger pointing in his face before he could grab ahold of it to keep her from poking his eye out.

"What are you talking about?" he asked her warily, his expression guarded and it hit her that he probably thought she was having some sort of late reaction to their fooling around, but she shook her head.

"You _told _on me, like we're in fucking first grade," she seethed, Blaine's eyes clouded with confusion for a moment.

"I'm still not following."

"30 seconds after I arrived on campus this morning, I was dragged into the headmasters office because _someone _told someone that I didn't come home last night. No one around here really notices what I'm doing except for you, Blaine, so power of deduction means that you _told _on me."

He laughed at her, actually laughed and she was tempted to smack him again but he caught her wrist and held it tightly before she could. "Rachel, are you insane? _Everyone _around here notices what you do. If you had to hear some of the things-the other day, even _Wesley _commented on how you don't bend your knees when you bend over to pick anything up and he caught a glimpse of your pink panties and an all too detailed description of your ass that I never thought I'd hear coming from his mouth."

"That doesn't deny that you're the one who got me in trouble, Blaine Anderson," she fumed, and if she had taken more than a moment to think about things she would have noticed how close they had somehow gotten, how tight his grip was on her wrist, but she was so mad that she just wanted him to let her go so she could storm off or hit him once more.

"I didn't tell on you, Rachel," he said quietly, calmly, "I figured you were off with Quinn. I had no reason to tell on you. Besides, I have a feeling you're incredibly vindictive and you could get me in so much more trouble."

"How?"

"Because of what we've done," he said, and he seemed to realize at the same moment that they were less than a foot apart, surprise in his eyes as he eyed her for a moment, but she was too angry to care.

"What? What have we done, Blaine? Can you even say it?" He stared at her for a minute, and it was like all the tension and anger she felt burst from her as she pushed him against the doorjam and kissed him fiercely, a sound of surprise falling from his lips before they were bruising her own.

Rachel only had enough forethought to drag him with her by the lapels of his shirt when she moved over to her bed, pulling him on top of her and they scrambled for skin upon skin. Her hands moved up the back of his shirt, nails digging in harshly as his own pushed her skirt up, ripping her underwear off and throwing them across the room without hesitance before his fingers were sliding inside of her, hard and fast.

She gasped against his throat, her hips arching into his touch and she could hear him mutter something along the lines of 'this, I'd get in trouble for this,' but the blood was rushing through her ears as she came, hard, around his fingers, clenching down on them and she could feel how hard he was when he grinded against her leg, desperately seeking friction for himself.

She pushed him over, removing his boxer briefs quickly and stroking him furiously, licking her lips as she looked up at him. His hips arched, his mouth falling open and she heard her name, faint, fall from his lips. Rachel could only let out a small groan of her own at the noise, closing her eyes and collecting herself before she straddled him quickly, holding him just enough to angle herself properly before her hands fell to his chest, Blaine gasping in surprise.

"Fuck, Rach," he moaned, his hands falling to her hips as she slid down on him, her own throat unable to do anything as her mouth went dry until he was completely buried inside of her. Blaine's grip was tight on her waist, his head thrown back as he chewed harshly on his lip, and she pulled herself back up only to slam back down, Blaine left unable to do anything but hold onto her tightly and let her do all the work.

She controlled the pace and found one that let him hit a certain angle inside her that made her unable to bite back a loud groan every time, his hand eventually slapping over her mouth to try and control her but she only bit down on his hand as she felt her skin tighten and her chest heaved underneath her blazer with the effort of fucking herself on him as she moved closer to another orgasm. It wasn't until he let out her name, louder than she had been when she swiveled her hips a certain way and he came hard inside of her that she fell over the edge again, her nails digging into his chest as she rode her orgasm out.

"Shit," he muttered as she whined and pulled herself off, giving herself a minute to breathe before their fight flew back at her.

She didn't say anything as she fixed her clothing, knowing she should probably change but she couldn't be in the room with him for too long before she either mounted him again or yelled at him again as all her anger came back, and when he touched her arm gently she drew him in for one last hungry kiss, letting her teeth sink into his bottom lip as she pulled away until she faintly tasted blood, licking it away before she stormed out of the room.

-:-

The room was fortunately empty when she went in it during her first class, hoping to shower and change quickly so that she could hopefully scrub off the memory and the feel of him from under her skin. She wanted to focus on her classes, didn't want him to get to her so badly like that.

It wasn't even until her detention that afternoon that it really hit her. She had basically taken advantage of him, given him no chance _to _fight her off, and shame and humility crawled over her. Blaine hadn't been lying to her, she knew, because he had no reason to lie. If he had been the one to turn her in, he would have admitted it with an apology and some statement about how he had just been worried about where she disappeared to. She figured it must have been Thad or someone who had noticed her sneaking off campus, and while she was mildly annoyed, she was too busy being disgusted with herself to care about being in trouble anymore. Detention only meant that she couldn't be in the Warblers meeting, that she could avoid Blaine longer, and that she could try and screw her head on straight.

Feelings or no, she had messed up big time. She was going to have to face the consequences, apologize to Blaine-which would be mortifying on its own-probably switch rooms and be stuck with some sort of actual creep who leered at her in her sleep and went through her drawers to jack off into her clothing.

Or maybe she'd wind up getting kicked out of Dalton completely, if he told anyone.

The worst part was, she didn't regret that it had happened, only how it had. Because she knew that if given the chance, she would do it all over again.

* * *

**AN: **Just a heads up - Kira is working on _And So We Run _right now, so it might be a little while until she gets to the next chapter, but we promise there will be an update eventually and we're not abandoning this project.

_We write, you read, you reviews, and we'll write more. We will anyway, but we love hearing from you. ~Ashley and Kira_


	8. Chapter 8

Blaine didn't know what to do.

It had all happened so fast. One minute Rachel was yelling, accusing him of things he hadn't done, and the next, her lips were fused to his and her hand was down his pants. He couldn't have stopped her even if he had wanted to; and he hadn't wanted to. He wasn't sure which was worse, not stopping her when he knew he should have, or that the thought never even crossed his mind. Maybe it was that, after she left in a hazy blur, every time he came anywhere near Rachel during the day, he was torn between hiding away in the nearest supply closest or pulling her _into _the supply closet for round two.

It only made sense to avoid her, and while that was easier said than done, he managed to make it through dinner without seeing her for more than a few seconds between classes; and in those few seconds, he nearly came apart at the seams every time. It was like walking on an electric high wire and by the time dinner was over, his nerves were frayed to the point he knew without a doubt he couldn't stay in their room together over night. Not tonight, possibly not ever again.

Because he wanted her. He wanted her in ways he never imagined before. He wanted to pin her against the wall, against the desk, the bed, the floor... He wanted to make her scream until she choked on his name. He wanted to see her smirk, that one that clearly told him she knew she had won and he wouldn't even care as he was buried deep inside her. And if he went back to his room, if she was there, that's exactly what would happen. And it just couldn't. He couldn't.

The problem was that there weren't many options when it came to places to stay. Everyone else had roommates and he wasn't allowed to drive home for the night without a reasonable excuse and somehow, he didn't' think "I really want to fuck my female roommate" was a very good thing to say to the headmaster. So it was either sleep in the library, or add insult to injury and go to the only other empty bed on campus. A bed that happened to belong to Sebastian, whom he had cheated on, three times now and was using his bed as a means of escape.

Thad didn't say much when Blaine knocked on his and Sebastian's door after dinner, asking if he could stay in his room for the night. He just let him inside, told him not to use the sandalwood mint body wash in the shower, and to please be observant of the proper Dalton curfew hours. "I have managed to maintain a proper sleeping schedule since your wanton partner has disappeared to Paris," he explained dramatically and it took every effort Blaine possessed to not roll his eyes, "and I would appreciate having one last night of rest before he returns tomorrow and renews his efforts to deteriorate my mental sanity."

The night passed by slowly – too slowly in fact – and no matter what he did, Blaine couldn't seem to concentrate. His homework muddled together in an unintelligible mass and he found his mind wandering back to Rachel and how she had looked on top of him. Chest flushed, eyes blown black, her nails digging into his chest. He would shake the thought away only to find it replaced with the memory of how tightly she had clamped around his fingers as she came, or the way her cheeks hollowed around him as she took him into her mouth. He was checking his phone, hoping for a message from her, but unable to send one himself. Even when Thad turned off the lights and Blaine climbed into Sebastian's bed, he couldn't get her out of his head.

By the time morning had come, Blaine still hadn't slept and his nerves were getting the best of him. He felt dizzy and even though part of him believed he was just making it up, he felt like if he tried to get up he might pass out. So for the first time in a long time, when his alarm sounded, he just turned it off and lay in bed, doing his best to ignore Thad rummaging around his closet silently for a new tie. It wasn't like his mornings with Rachel, where she would sing under her breath, or mutter in frustration as she looked for one of her headbands. A wave of nausea washed over him when he realized he missed that.

"Are you not coming to class?" Thad asked him ten minutes before the first block was set to begin.

Blaine shook his head slowly. "I don't feel well," he said thickly, his mouth feeling full of cotton.

"Should I fetch the nurse?" Thad asked and Blaine had to smile at his genuine concern.

"No," he answered, playing it up with a scratchy voice.

"I could bring you medication," Thad suggested, setting his bag gingerly across his shoulders. "Or I happen to be on good terms with one of the sous chefs and I'm sure she would allow me to bring you some soup. You may borrow my spare blanket if you like."

"Really, I'll be fine," Blaine insisted. "I think I just need some sleep and a day off."

"If you feel up for the trip," Thad said as he opened the door, "there's a quite expensive humidifier in the closest that Sebastian says I'm not allowed to use, as it ruins his hair; you are free to use it of course."

"Thanks Thad," Blaine said sincerely, though he couldn't seem to find any room in his head to feel guilty for basically lying to his friend. "Take notes for me?"

"Certainly."

Blaine sunk back into Sebastian's bed as Thad left, knowing that he could trust the boy to tell everyone that Blaine was ill and wanted to be left alone. Underneath his sometimes abrasive personality, he meant well. He actually reminded him a bit of Sebastian, though both boys would strangle him if he ever said it out loud. But now that he was gone, Blaine could feel sleep trying to overtake him as his body tried to make up for last night and he didn't have a reason to fight it any longer. Still, as he closed his eyes, Rachel's appeared – wild and angry and full of lust – to haunt him in his dreams.

He woke to a gentle hand ruffling through his hair, and with a start, he wondered if Rachel had found him. But when he looked over and locked eyes with a vibrant and grinning Sebastian, his heart seemed to plummet and soar all at once. His boyfriend grinned at him, not a leer or a smirk, but an honest to God smile he seemed to save for Blaine alone. "Hey there Killer," Sebastian whispered, his hand still woven into Blaine's curls.

"Hi," Blaine breathed, a small smile forming across his lips and felt like a betrayal. He shouldn't feel so happy to have Sebastian home, not when he'd done the worst thing Blaine could imagine to him, but after two weeks had gone by without seeing him and barely talking to him, Blaine realized how much he had truly missed him. It was almost a relief, that feeling; maybe it really did mean that his incidents with Rachel were born out of loneliness.

"You're lucky I don't get jet lag," Sebastian chuckled, stripping off his stylish jacket and tossing it across the room. "I would have kicked you out of my bed."

"You could never kick me out of your bed," Blaine retorted. "I'm too cute."

"Your words, not mine," Sebastian smiled again, crawling over Blaine to lay down next to him, his arms catching around Blaine's waist. "Why are you in my bed?"

Blaine gulped nervously and he scrambled for an excuse. "I didn't feel well," he explained quickly, "and Rachel is a bit of a germophobe and I knew Thad wouldn't mind if I stayed here. Plus he has a humidifier and -."

"That fucking humidifier," Sebastian groaned. "He just tinkers with it all night long and it's the most aggravating thing I think I've ever seen a grown man do. Not that I'd call Thad grown, or a man."

"So it's not because it messes up your hair?" Blaine teased.

"My hair is naturally perfect," Sebastian joked, tugging on a stand near his forehead and Blaine watched as it sprung immediately back into place.

"I bet I could mess it up," Blaine said without thinking it through and suddenly, Sebastian had rolled on top of him, using his hands to prop himself up while his knees parted Blaine's, settling between his legs until their hips were aligned. Blaine could feel Sebastian grow harder against his thigh and he bit back a groan as his own dick twitched in anticipation. It was like his body was rebelling against him, after spending so long dealing with Blaine's increasingly dirty thoughts about Rachel with no physical release, it was desperate to be touched.

"Missed me?" Sebastian whispered in his ear, his breath hot and heavy as he kissed the edge of Blaine's jaw and down his neck. Without missing a beat, his hands pulled Blaine's shirt up and over his head as Sebastian made his way down Blaine's chest, stopping only when he reached the edge of his boxers. His tongued dipped under the elastic before his teeth sunk into his flesh. Blaine's hip bucked before he could think to stop them and he heard Sebastian laugh, tugging the cotton away from Blaine, his mouth working around Blaine's tip before he could even react.

He tried to let himself get lost in the way his boyfriend's lips circled around him perfectly, but even as Sebastian's tongue wrapped around his shaft, Blaine couldn't keep the memory of Rachel's perfect whines out of his head, or the way her own tongue would lie flat against his underside, firm strokes up and down even as her mouth pulled him in until he was practically crawling down her throat. And even when he thought she was done, she would take him in further, her tongue flickering out to lick the skin at the top of his balls.

But it wasn't Rachel, he had to remind himself, it was Sebastian and even if his mind was elsewhere, Blaine was close to coming in Sebastian's mouth. "Seb-" he tried to warn in a stuttering breath, but there wasn't enough time and he unloaded, catching Sebastian by surprise. Sebastian finished him off with his hand, the sticky mess ending up mostly on Blaine's stomach, which Sebastian cleaned up with Blaine's previously discarded shirt.

"Cut it a little close there," Sebastian said, kissing him lightly on the corner of his mouth.

"Sorry," Blaine muttered, a deep flush flooding his cheeks.

"I'll forgive you this time," Sebastian answered, "because I missed you too."

The words stung; Blaine had missed him but he couldn't honestly say it was Sebastian alone who had made him come just then, and that was not something you said to your boyfriend. It wasn't something you said to anyone and suddenly, he was angry. It was like he had something to prove to himself, to Sebastian who didn't even know, but it spurred him forward as he flipped Sebastian over on the bed, straddling him this time and pulled him into a deep, harsh kiss.

Sebastian hesitated only for a moment before he responded readily, tongue and teeth clashing against Blaine's as they fought for dominance. It wasn't usually like this between them. Blaine was content to let Sebastian take the lead, but he needed to show _anyone _that he wanted his boyfriend, that his tiny brunette roommate didn't mean anything to him, not like this.

"Blaine," Sebastian gasped as Blaine tried to push his jeans out of the way. "I can't right now."

"Why not?" Blaine growled, rolling his hips up into Sebastian's.

"I have meetings," Sebastian said thickly, as if the last thing he wanted to do was leave right now, "with the headmaster and my teachers in three minutes."

Blaine groaned, his hand moving away from cupping Sebastian through his pants and let his head fall against his chest. "You should leave then," he said, his voice sounding strange and flat even to his own ears. He knew Sebastian had picked up on it when his long fingers started running through Blaine's hair again.

"You okay there, Killer?" he asked, genuine concern lancing his words.

"I'll be fine," Blaine murmured, pressing a small kiss to Sebastian's skin for good measure.

"We can pick this up again later?" Sebastian suggested and Blaine knew he was just trying to lighten the mood, to make him feel better, but there was nothing left in Blaine but a myriad of confusion and guilt, of green and chocolate eyes, two very different laughs, two very different tastes, and he was at a loss of what to do about any of it.

"I'll have to make up what I missed today in class," Blaine said, shaking his head at his lame excuse, "and you'll have two weeks you'll have to get started on. It's fine. It's not like you're going anywhere for awhile."

"Right," Sebastian said, somewhat unconvincingly, but Blaine wasn't entirely sure it wasn't his own projections he was forcing on Sebastian. "We'll have time to make up our own stuff later."

Blaine smiled at him. Sebastian didn't seem to notice the slight waver in the corner of his lips and Blaine helped him get ready, fixing his so-called perfect hair for him before Sebastian left. And once again, Blaine was left feeling like his entire world had been flipped on it's head and shaken up while he was stuck in the middle of it.

There wasn't much point, he decided, to sitting around Sebastian's room any longer. Being there, alone, with him, thinking of her, it hadn't helped much except to prove to him that he was as screwed up as he originally thought he was. There was no use hiding anymore, and with Sebastian back, he couldn't very well spend the night in his and Thad's room again, considering that all of Dalton knew he was dating Sebastian. He would be suspended at the very least, possibly expelled. It wasn't a _bad _option.

But his father would have a conniption and likely buy Blaine's way back in to the school and he'd be stuck exactly where he was now. So if he couldn't solve anything, he could at act like a functioning member of society and go to dinner on his own. Maybe somehow along the way, everything else would start to fall into place.

Of course, the first piece of the puzzle to fall was Rachel, sitting on her own at a table in the corner of the dining hall, casually stabbing her salad to death. Blaine's first instinct was the same as it had been since the morning before: to run. Still, he couldn't run forever and if he ever wanted to go back to some kind of normalcy, he would have to talk to her. She was his friend at the very least, and his roommate, and in some ways, she felt like she had become a part of him in the short time he's known her.

And if they could talk about this in a relatively public place, there was a significantly lesser chance that she would yell at him, or that he might bend her over the table and take her while Thad and the rest of the Warblers, not to mention half of the school, looked on in shock.

"Hey," he said tentatively, setting the spaghetti he knew he wouldn't eat on the table between them.

"Do I know you?" she said with a glare and he bit back the deep sigh that formed in his chest.

"Blaine Anderson, majoring in Jackass," he replied instead with a weak chuckle, hoping she might soften towards him if he pretended he wasn't internally running for the hills. "Minor in Apologies."

"You would have to study both of those," Rachel snipped, her voice as sharp as a razor, but he could see the hint of a smile at the corner of her lips, "if you wanted to be a decent human being."

"That's the goal," Blaine nodded as he sat down, feeling comfortable enough that she wouldn't dump the rest of her salad over his head. "Listen, Rach, about the other morning-."

"You mean when I practically raped you?"

The laugh escaped him before he could stop it. She raised her eyebrows in surprise, but didn't say anything else, simply waited for him to get a hold of himself. "You just don't hold back at all," he grinned, still chuckling and there must have been something in the way he said it or the way he looked at her, because she started giggling softly with him. "I just wanted to say that I'm not mad at you."

"I'm not mad at you either," she said quickly, as if she had been waiting to tell him that for two days. "I know you didn't turn me in. You had no reason to, and I'm sorry I ever thought you would."

Blaine should have known this was going to well to last, because as soon as he opened his mouth to get into the hard part with her – the part about _what _they were doing, as they were way past the point pretending this was a one time thing – a group of lower classmen he helped tutor came over to ask if he was feeling better. For a moment, he had forgotten that he had Thad spread the rumor that he had been sick, so he spent a good few minutes reassuring them that he was fine, it was just a fluke, thank you very much for your concern. All he wanted to do was tell them to fuck off.

"Popular as ever I see," Rachel quipped when the small crowd finally left.

"Well, right now, I wish everyone would leave me alone so I can talk to you," Blaine sighed, rubbing nervously on the back of his neck.

"We're talking," she said warily, crossing her arms over her chest and he couldn't help but notice how defensive the action looked.

"I mean we need to talk about _us_," he pressed.

"What makes you think there is an us?" Rachel asked. "Apart from what we already are?"

"You're kidding right?" Blaine scoffed. "What are we? We're roommates and I'd like to think we're friends, and oh yeah, we casually fuck around with each other every time we so much as look at each other."

"You're making a big deal out of nothing," Rachel hissed, though her eyes were suddenly much wider than normal and if he wasn't mistaken, slightly panicked. "Trust me Blaine, this isn't something new for me, okay? This is what I do. I fuck my friends, and then we stay friends. That's all there is to it unless you try to make it more complicated."

"It's already complicated Rachel!" he yelled and would have continued if not for the hand that fell to his shoulder.

"Is everything okay here?" Thad asked, his hand brushing imaginary dust from Blaine's shoulders as he spoke, turning to Rachel. "I do hope you're not doing anything to purposely stress Blaine out. He's been sick and doesn't need the rise in blood pressure."

"Thad, I appreciate it," Blaine groaned, brushing his hand away, "but I'm trying to have a conversation."

"No Thad," Rachel snapped, her chair scraping across the linoleum as she stood up. "You stay, our conversation is over." She stormed off before he had a chance to convince her to stay, and with Thad hovering around, he couldn't immediately chase after her either. By the time he managed to escape the dining hall, she was long gone.

He found her in their room later, but she was even more unwilling to talk to him than she had been before. As soon as he walked into the room, she barricaded herself into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind her in a clear message that if he valued his life, he wouldn't bother her. And for some reason, even after everything that had happened over the last two days, the last few weeks even, this pissed him off more than anything else had. He had tried, damn it, he had tried really fucking hard to talk to her and work things out and it was her fault that they couldn't. He didn't even care what they decided to do, as long as they were on the same page but it didn't even feel like they were in the same book.

He slammed his dresser drawers shut and undressed, leaving his clothes scattered all over her side of the room, something he knew she hated and he was feeling petty enough to not care. At least for one night, if she didn't care, then he wouldn't either.

* * *

_We write, you read, you review, and we'll write more... and hopefully we'll write faster this time, oops._

_~Ashley and Kira. _


	9. Chapter 9

Rachel had gotten used to living in an uncomfortable silence over the past couple days. In her defense against Blaine, he had somehow decided ignoring her was the safest course of action, and she couldn't necessarily find it in herself to blame him. She had flipped out on him, worried about the rejection she was going to face and instead blocked herself off from it.

Which meant that, come Saturday morning when she felt someone crawl under the covers with her, she was momentarily confused until a whiff of familiar perfume hit her nostrils and she popped open an eye to see Quinn lying next to her, a smirk on her features. "Morning, sleepyhead," she teased nearly silently, and Rachel sat up a little to see Blaine still fast asleep on the bed opposite hers, feet tangled in the blankets and Quinn followed her gaze with a questioning expression before Rachel had to wonder how she had even gotten into her room in the first place.

"How are you here?" she whispered, Quinn moving naturally around her dorm as if she was there all the time and not appearing for the first time since she'd been shipped away.

"Your door was unlocked," Quinn frowned as she threw clothes at Rachel, snapping her fingers as quietly as she could. "Now get up, we're getting food."

Rachel threw on the jeans Quinn had thrown at her, glad that outside of classes she wasn't forced to wear the uniform she trotted around in every other day, yawning quietly as she grabbed her room key and led Quinn down to the cafeteria, the room fairly empty for so early on a Saturday morning.

"What's wrong?" Quinn asked as she joined Rachel at her normal table, Rachel nearly spilling her granola all over the wooden surface instead of on her yogurt.

"Nothing?" she lied, knowing that there was nothing she could tell Quinn that could be stated in a public place even if it was deserted. She could feel Thad, David and Wes staring at them from a few tables away, Thad's whispers traveling over in an ambiguous manner that led her to believe he was probably gossiping about her and making up libelous accusations about her relationship with Quinn-accusations that Rachel really couldn't deny, she supposed.

"Rachel Berry, you're lying to me," Quinn accused, but there was a smile tugging at the corner of her lips and Rachel knew she wasn't really upset. "Is it about Blaine?" the blonde asked as she leaned forward, the words coming out of her mouth so quietly that Rachel could have easily brushed them off and ignored them if she so chose, but her eyes widened slightly and gave her away, leaving Quinn to nod in response before prattling on about how Finn had taken to asking out Brittany, nearly causing his own decapitation from Santana while Puck laughed on in the background.

Rachel smiled as she tried to focus on the gossip, but it almost seemed like it was all from another life. Santana's incredibly obvious affections for Brittany rarely affected her day to day life anymore, she hadn't spoken to Finn in almost two weeks, even Puck had stopped trying to 'accidentally' sext her and it was like Quinn was the only one who really noticed she was still gone.

It was a melancholy feeling to add on top of everything else, rejection and abandonment and she knew that she had been the one to leave, really, but she hadn't expected her friends to forget she had been there so soon.

"Talk," Quinn said as soon as Rachel unlocked her dorm room door, not even giving her time to kick her shoes back off and throw her key on her desk. She held up her finger, pausing to hear Blaine moving around in the bathroom and shook her head to symbolize that she couldn't, not just yet, at the same time he popped his head out of the bathroom door.

"Hi?" he greeted, a little confused and Rachel tried adamantly to not notice that he was still only half dressed, jeans unbuttoned and shirt laying across his bed as he paused brushing his teeth, balancing his history text book with his free hand.

"Blaine, Quinn, Quinn, Blaine," Rachel introduced, keeping her tone as flat as she could so that no emotion could run through it, but seeing him only seemed to ignite the annoyance and anger through her bloodstream once more, and the names fell off her tongue with an almost hostile ring to them.

"Pleasure," Blaine said, turning to spit the toothpaste out of his mouth before dropping his history book back on his bed and sliding into his shirt, Quinn raising an eyebrow in what Rachel knew to be appreciation and her own eyes narrowed before she could stop herself.

"Can you please leave?" Rachel asked after a moment of his wandering around the room seemingly aimlessly, keeping her face as impassive as possible.

"It's my room too," Blaine retorted, his own tone hard now that the pleasantries of being introduced were over and Rachel just sent a glare in his direction.

"I have a friend over," she snapped, all pretense at getting along disappearing as she held her ground.

"I really need to talk to Rachel," Quinn said quietly, her hand holding onto Rachel's bicep to calm her down, and Blaine's eyes flickered to the blonde for a moment before he continued muttering and pacing, grabbing his bag and all but running out of the room, pausing only momentarily to look back at Rachel-and she felt his gaze, and all the many mixed emotions it held, but she ignored it, crossing her arms over her chest until he was gone, finally leaving the two of them alone, if only because of his debate team rehearsal and Sebastian's lacrosse game that afternoon.

Rachel slumped on the bed, letting out a loud groan of frustration as she hid her face in her hands, Quinn chuckling lightly as she sat down next to her, pulling her hands away until she was forced to look over at her.

"I take it things aren't going well?" Quinn asked, keeping her tone light and airy and Rachel buried her face in Quinn's knee for a minute before resting her head on the girls thigh, long fingers playing with her hair absent-mindedly as she did so.

"We had sex," she finally whispered.

"Oh, is that all?" Quinn joked, though her smile turned into a frown at Rachel's returning glare. "Tell me what happened."

So she did. She spilled out her guts about how she had been mad and how emotions had been high strung and something in her had snapped, her desire for him taking over and how she had practically raped him, hardly giving him a chance to reject her or tell her it was as far from what he wanted as possible, only stopping her story when Quinn started laughing so hard there were nearly tears coming from her eyes.

"What?" Rachel snapped, unamused by her best friends response. She was supposed to feel pity and hug Rachel and tell her that they'd figure it out, room her with someone else, get her out of Dalton in the first place, but Quinn just brushed a stray piece of hair out of Rachel's face and smiled at her.

"If that look he shot your way before he left was any indication, he wanted it just as badly as you did."

"He didn't shoot me a look," she muttered, ignoring the roll of Quinn's eyes as she stood up to pace about the bedroom, nearly tripping on one of Blaine's shirts that he had started leaving on the floor just because he knew it got under her skin. "He didn't, he hates me and I hate him and this is just getting more stressful by the day!" she finally exploded, throwing the shirt across the room towards his hamper before falling onto his bed, groaning when she realized what she had done.

Quinn moved over with her, running a thumb comfortingly over the apple of her cheek and Rachel tried to let herself relax into her friends touch, but it was more the scent of Blaine surrounding the blankets she was laying on that did it. "He did too," Quinn argued softly. "And I may not know him at all, but that look said a lot. Including that it was most definitely hardly considered 'rape' in his mind. So relax, please?"

She sighed, nodding. Quinn was almost always right about these things, and Rachel trusted her judgment, more than her own sometimes. "I just don't know what to do now. How are we supposed to move on from this?"

"The same way you moved on from Jesse and Finn," Quinn reminded her, "by facing it head on and stop your running. You're Rachel Berry, and you don't back down because things are hard or uncomfortable. Do you want him?"

Rachel hesitated, but Quinn's stare hardened and she nodded, finally admitting it out loud. "I want him bad," she shrugged, and Quinn smirked.

"Clearly. Do you want to do it again?" She blushed, Quinn's turn to roll her eyes but she nodded and Quinn seemed to take this as enough incentive to continue. "Then you have to talk to him."

"Talk?" Rachel questioned, raising an eyebrow at just how Quinn had gotten to that logical solution.

"Yes," Quinn said, "With words. Both of you obviously have a lot you need to get out and nothing is going to get any better until you hash it out with him."

She pursed her lips, knowing full well that Quinn was right, but that didn't exactly make it any better for her. She didn't want to talk to Blaine, because talking had never been her strong suit. She was more of a woman of action, showing instead of explaining, and she didn't even know what she wanted from him.

Quinn did her best to distract her, taking her off campus for what felt like the first time in years and the two of them even met up with Puck and Finn; for a little while, it was almost like old times with the four of them. Finn gave Rachel a piggy back ride across the park when she complained that her feet hurt and Puck spun Quinn around when Rachel held her hand a little too long, but every so often she'd be nagged by the thought of Blaine, and what he was doing and if he was, at the very least, relaxing.

It wasn't until Finn had to leave, kissing Rachel chastely on the cheek and telling her he missed her around to kick New Directions asses into shape for competitions, and Puck attempted to lure Quinn and her into a threesome with him that she knew she had to travel back to Dalton, back to the monotony and back to Blaine.

It had taken her all afternoon to come to terms with it, but Quinn was right. They skated around the issue so much, Rachel built up walls and panicked and fled every time the subject was broached and that only led to Blaine getting annoyed and frustrated in return. They needed to lay everything out and tackle it head on if they were going to continue to have to live with one another, and more importantly-boundaries had to be reinstated between them.

He was lying face down on his mattress when she walked in, dropping her bag on the floor before sitting cross legged on her own bed and watching him until he would take notice of her. He wasn't asleep, she knew, and she cursed herself for being able to tell something as simple as that.

It took a few minutes for him to turn his head and look at her, worrying her lip between her teeth and she instantly felt a pang of regret when she saw how worn down he looked. He had enough on his plate without her drama being mixed into things, and the "I'm sorry!" burst out of her before she could stop it.

"You're sorry?" he questioned, moving to sit up so that he was now facing her directly, the two on opposite ends of the room but it felt like opposite ends of the world, they had become so distant. And Rachel didn't want that, fooling around with him wasn't worth that. He had become her only real friend at Dalton and it only seemed to solidify her decision to put a stop to things if it came to losing out on that for a few meaningless orgasms.

"Yes," she stated, "I'm sorry. I know that this is probably extremely confusing for you, given that you've never done these things with a girl and never had any inclination to in the past, but they're confusing for me too. I've never gone after someone I can't claim as 'mine' in some sort of fashion, and it's messing with my head."

"What about Quinn?" he said with a raised eyebrow, and Rachel shrugged because - well, in her mind it was a lot different than what she had with Blaine.

"In our own little way, Quinn is mine. We're best friends, and I can't imagine a life without her. She pulls me out of funks and makes me realize when I'm in the wrong and talks logic into me in a way no one else can. And yes, we fool around when we've been drinking or things get stressful and while we don't have any sort of romantic feelings for one another, we're still each other's and that's not going to change."

"Is that what you want? For something to change between us? For me to be, what, your boyfriend?" he questioned, and she rolled her eyes, shaking her head at his conclusion.

"Quinn and I never dated," she reminded him, but that was beside the point as it was. "And after living in a school full of boys and hearing just how vulgar they are, I think I can successfully say I may never want a boyfriend ever again," she shuddered, eliciting a small laugh from Blaine that only seemed to put a small smile on her own face.

"I feel you've not only heard far worse, but probably done it too," he grinned, the tension suddenly gone from between them and she threw a pillow at him in mock offense that he caught and put down beside him.

They settled down, and Rachel chewed on her lip for a moment to formulate the best way to say what she needed. "I won't deny that I'm attracted to you - I can't, really, after the other day. But you have a boyfriend, and I should have respected that. So I'm going to back off."

"What if I don't want you to?"

The words seemed to fall out of his mouth before either of them realized what he had done, Rachel's eyes opening wide as her eyebrows shot up and his face turned an almost endearingly pink at the admission, his hand rubbing the back of his neck but he didn't take the statement back, and she felt her stomach churned at the notion.

"You have a boyfriend," she reiterated, waving her hand towards the door as if that symbolized Sebastian's mere presence and Blaine looked down at his lap at her reminder as he nodded.

"I know I do," he said quietly, running his hands up and down his thighs as he looked contemplatively towards the area she had motioned towards. "But that doesn't change what I said."

She took a deep breath, nodding and trying to figure out exactly what that meant. Because if it meant what she thought it did-that he wanted her as much as she wanted him-they were headed for a world of trouble. Lying and secrets were never things she was good at keeping up with, which had been helping hands in the reason she was thrown into a private all boys school in the first place.

"Where does that leave us?" she asked quietly, brushing back a stray hair and keeping herself very still on her bed while he plucked at the sheet covering her pillow on his lap, shrugging his shoulders. She had been right, she knew, to say that he was just as confused as she was. This was a giant mess they were falling into, but neither seemed willing to pull back and she doubted either would. "If Sebastian-"

"He won't know," Blaine said firmly, glancing up at her and meeting her gaze and she was nearly taken aback by the sudden fierceness in his determination and it caused her own guard to go up slightly.

"I won't tell him," she said warily, "because that would look bad for both of us and despite what I may have shown over the past few days, I don't hate you and I don't want to hurt you."

"You just want to fuck me," he said lewdly, a smirk on his face and she smirked back before moving to steal her pillow back from him just so she could hit him upside the head with it, his laughter loud as he pulled her down to sit next to him.

"The thought might have crossed my mind once or twice," she said wryly, and he continued to smirk at her as he ran his thumb across her cheek, cupping her chin so that she'd look right at him.

"I am confused," he admitted, his voice soft and she listened with rapt attention so that she wouldn't miss a word. "Because I do have a boyfriend, one that I've been with a long time before you came around. But I'd be lying if I said I could get you off my mind and give you up cold turkey."

She blushed, but didn't say anything and after a moment, he continued, resting his forehead against her own until his breath was fanning across her face and she could feel her heartbeat pick up. "I don't want to hurt him, but I don't want to stop this either. I don't think I can stop this, unless you put an end to it. And if that's what you really want, then fine. We'll both back off, and we'll figure out a way to put it behind us and be nothing more than just roommates and friends."

She let her hand fall to his knee, squeezing it even though she didn't know what she wanted to tell him. She had never meant to start something with him, not when he had a boyfriend and she had decided to go running into the hills away from all this not an hour prior, back when he wasn't an inch away from her own face and his completely enraptured by him.

"I know where I stand," he told her, looking at her earnestly. "I want you. And if you want me, then we'll figure out the rest as it falls."

* * *

_We write, you read, you review, and we'll write more... no but really, we just love hearing from you._

_~Ashley and Kira_


	10. Chapter 10

Part of him expected that by sleeping with her, they could get rid the charged atmosphere and sexual tension, that it would just start to dissipate and they would get sick of each other. He hoped he could work her out of his system; but even after a month of fucking around behind closed doors, she still managed to work her way under his skin. If anything, it only seemed to get worse. They could hardly make it out the door in the morning without falling apart in each other's hands and if he saw her during the day, all she had to do was look at him with that heated gaze and his blood was boiling until he could touch her again. It was obvious to him now that one did not just shake Rachel Berry.

But they were getting to be somewhat reckless, not even waiting until they were back in their room to steal a few moments to themselves. Only a few days ago, she had cornered him in an old supply closest, her hand down his pants before he even had a second to _think _this shouldn't have happened there. And now here he was, practically dragging her into the room in the wall of the library, shoving her against the wall even before she had the door completely closed. She didn't seem to mind; she never seemed to mind, just rose to meet him in a bruising kiss, her teeth sinking into the soft flesh of his lower lip.

"You're going to be very late for French," he growled, her hands already working the buckled of his belt free as his own had disappeared under her skirt, shoving her underwear to one side so her could slide two fingers up into her, hard and fast enough to make her gasp, her hands stilling as she took him in. Her eyes closed as her head fell back, exposing the perfect tanned skin of her neck. His mouth latched onto it immediately, nipping at the cord of muscle just above her collarbone until she let out a lewd moan, her hands working even faster to get him out of his slacks.

"J'ai besoin de toi," she whispered into his ear, catching the sensitive skin between her teeth just as her hand wrapped around the base of cock, the combination of both sending shocks up his spine. "J'ai pensé à votre bite toute la journée."

It was a new breed of torture, the way her melodic voice made the French language sound so sweet, so innocent, when her actual words were anything but. He slammed his fingers into her as far as he could go, crashing his lips over her to hold back the scream he knew she wouldn't be able to hold back and he could feel her starting to clench around his hold on her. She wasn't quite there, but she was close and he just wasn't done with her yet. He slid his fingers out of her, ignoring her whine of protest as he rolled his hips into her just as his dripping fingers found their way into her mouth. She licked them clean greedily, practically humming as she did. It didn't last long, her soft murmurs changing to a sharp gasp as he tugged harshly on her hair, forcing her to turn around away from him. Her legs spread for him automatically, her fingers splayed against the wall.

"Baise-moi," she urged him, and he didn't even wait a second as he buried himself into her in one swift stroke, watching as her hands balled into fists. His own were gripping her hips, guiding her back down onto him as fast as she could keep up.

"You've never been so wet," he muttered as he slammed into her again, relishing her strangled cries as she tried to stay quiet. "Your cunt's practically begging for it."

"Just fuck me," she pleaded as she began to tighten around him once more. "Please Blaine, let me come."

He groaned as the sound of her voice washed over him; she was trusting him to be in control, to take care of her, no questions asked, and it was such a fucking ridiculous thing to notice in the middle of all this, but he did nonetheless. Because he didn't have this anywhere else, only with her and that and the way she moaned his name and how she seemed to crash into him and her soft skin and her bruised lips and tangled hair and blackened eyes and just _fucking everything _that made him come undone, spilling into her as she came with him after one last deep thrust.

They stayed pressed against the wall for a moment, breaths mingling together as they came down. He could feel her leg shaking from his light grip on her hip and his arms circled around her waist for support. She leaned back into him, her lips pressing languid kisses to his neck until their nerves seemed to still, and their bodies began to function an a semi-normal basis again.

"You okay?" he whispered, his fingers playing with a button on her twisted white shirt.

She giggled, turning around and straightening her skirt as she leaned up on her toes to kiss him, a sweet moment in comparison to the way they usually threw each other around. "Perfect," she assured him. "And you?"

"Much better," he laughed, intertwining his fingers with hers for a moment before letting them fall. "My dad called again... I mean, if you were wondering why I- why now."

"I'm sorry," she said, her face falling into a frown. "You know what ever he said wasn't true."

"I know," he nodded, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear because for some reason, he just could not stop touching her. "I just need you to remind me sometimes."

She smiled again, and kissed him briefly on the lips one last time before he took him by the hand and led him out of the room and through the empty library. She didn't let go of him until they reached the double entry doors, and even then she seemed to hesitate before finally letting go and heading down the hall to her class. He watched her leave, the way her hair would swing as she walked, the little bounce in her step, and he couldn't hold back the smile that formed as she turned the corner.

-:-

Rachel had a way of making everything seem easy; she studied and she passed without worry, she sang like it was the breath in her lungs and not like it was just something she had signed up to do, and she had no problem working in time with him during her day no matter what else she had going on. It was effortless and Blaine envied that of her. Because even if he couldn't stop seeing her, he also couldn't stop his studies, or his extracurriculars, or his family, or keeping up with Sebastian, and his body was screaming for a reprieve he just didn't have time for.

So as he sat in one of the Warblers' meetings – Rachel on one side, their knees flushed together, and his head leaning on Sebastian's shoulder on the other – he found himself fading in and out of consciousness no matter how hard he tried to pay attention to Wes' annual discussion on what they would wear to Regionals in only a few short weeks. He didn't know why it mattered; they always wore the same navy jacket with the red piping and the striped tie, but someone still managed to bring up alternative suggestions every year and according to Thad's handbook, they were required to open the floor up for debate until a majority came to an agreement.

Blaine was startled awake suddenly at the sound of Rachel's voice and the warmth of her thigh leaving his as she stood up. "I would like to open a forum," she announced, speaking formally as he had taught her when she had first started singing with the Warblers, "to discuss the distribution of solos and which member or members of the Dalton Academy Warblers would be chosen to represent us to the best of our ability."

"So opened," Wes said with a bang of his gavel before he gestured for her to continue.

"I understand that there is an audition process to be considered for a solo," she explained, "but I wasn't attending Dalton when those took place. While I do love Blaine's voice and believe we have a better than most chance of winning with him in the lead, I would also liked to be considered for my own solo. My talents can speak for themselves, I believe, although I would have no issue with undergoing any audition process the council would see fit."

And as if she couldn't help herself, she smiled that devilish smile of hers and winked in Wes' direction, causing their distinguished leader to blush as he flustered around with the notebook in front of him. "Thank you for your consideration," Rachel concluded, sitting back down as Blaine tried not to laugh.

"Thank you for your proposal," Wes muttered. "As solos are decidedly a council matter, we will discuss this behind closed doors, but I have to say that I, personally, am intrigued."

Blaine's mirth disappeared instantly; he couldn't care less about losing a solo, but that fact that Wes was even _considering _it was absolutely unexpected. He wasn't as bad as Thad was about Rachel – though in his defense, Thad had warmed to her slightly when he stopped complaining about her standing in the front of their formations – but Wes was a traditionalist when it came to the Warblers and allowing a girl, the only one in Dalton's history, a spotlight moment during competition was definitely not something Blaine would have ever expected Wes to consider.

"I think it's a good idea," Sebastian shouted over the din of murmurs going through the crowd. "A boy's choir with a female lead? That's got some balls; no pun intended."

Blaine felt like he was in some kind of fever dream as Rachel, somewhat startled by Sebastian's indirect compliment, gave his boyfriend a hesitant smile and not only did Sebastian return it, but he reached out and gave her a quick squeeze of her shoulder as a kind of congratulatory show. Maybe he really had fallen asleep, or maybe he had finally cracked under all the pressure and expectations placed on him, the way Sebastian always joked he would. But it didn't feel that way; he was alert and extremely aware that everyone else had lost their damn minds.

"What the hell was that?" he asked Wes as soon as everyone else left the meeting, somehow managing to shake both Rachel and Sebastian. "You're giving her a solo?"

"Now Blaine," Wes said and Blaine couldn't help but feel like he was being condescended to, "I understand that you worked hard to earn your place as our soloist, and the council would never take that away from you, but Rachel has presented an interesting idea that I feel needs further evaluation. She's talented and unexpected from us and just might be what pushes us over the edge to win Regionals this year."

There was logic in what Wes was saying, Blaine couldn't deny that, but there had been logic in Sebastian's suggestion that they have multiple soloists in each song, and in David's suggestion that they showcase their dancing in a more fluid manner, and neither of those had been warranted important enough for "further evaluation."

"Cut the shit Wesley," Blaine snapped, his eyes narrowing as the other boy lost his usual cool composure and began to sputter. "I don't care about the solos and neither do you and we both know it. You just want on Rachel's good side, same as half the other guys in this school. Trust me when I say you don't stand a chance with her. She'll eat you alive before you even knew she was there."

"That is absurd," Wes argued, "and if you don't take a moment to calm down and adjust your attitude, I may have to find you in violation of our sportsmanship creed and suspend all of your solos, Warbler Anderson."

Blaine glared at him and half of him just wanted to continue to yell at him, to force Wes to suspend him from the competition all together, but the group had put too much work into shaping the competition around him and if he didn't sing at Regionals, the news would get back to his father who would insist it was only further proof that Blaine was wasting everyone's time by focusing anywhere outside of academia. It was honestly almost worth it, but he could practically see Rachel's disappointed face and he held back, choosing to stalk off instead. The only thing on his mind was finding Rachel and working out wherever this burning rage wrapping its way around his heart had come from.

-:-

During the next practice, Wes announced that Rachel and Blaine would share a duet during the closing number while Blaine would continue to hold the rest of the solos for the competition, for "practical reasons". Rachel had been thrilled and instead of leaving with Blaine like she had since the very first day, she stayed behind to thank Wes on her own. She had only been gone an extra fifteen minutes, but she came back to their room as smug as he'd ever seen her and when he asked why, she told him she had a date – with Wes. He didn't let her say much after that, choosing instead to hoist her up on her desk as he bent to his knees until he was buried between her legs and his name was the only one she knew.

That didn't stop her from going out with Wes – not that it was supposed to – a few days later when classes were canceled for a teacher's work day. The students were supposed to use the time to study, but they were allowed to leave campus if they so chose to, and most everyone was treating it like a free day. It wasn't for Blaine, not really, as his debate team had agreed to host an extra two-hour practice to gear up for a showing they had next month, but after watching get ready for her date, he couldn't seem to find any kind of motivation whatsoever to actually get up and go.

"Honestly, you should take a break," she had said to him as she left, her hair falling in soft curls around her shoulders, matching the delicate curves of her hips and legs in her little blue sundress. "Not even Wes is studying today."

He didn't know how to ask her not to leave; couldn't even explain to himself why he didn't want her too, but he knew she wouldn't have listened to him either way. So he wished her a good time and propped his chemistry book up in the corner of his bed as he lay down and attempted to study some before his debate meeting. His eyes began to lose focus and he have the vague thought that he should at least set an alarm before he drifted off the sleep, dreaming of short skirts and silky hair in Paris.

He didn't know how long he slept, but sunlight was still streaming through the window when the door to his room opened with a creak. He turned slightly to see Rachel moved gracefully and quietly into the room, shutting the door without an additional sound. She kicked off her shoes, dropping her bag to the desk and started fumbling with the zipper at the back of her dress. He didn't even bother to look away as he might have once; after all he'd seen of her and all she'd seen of him, watching her undress was nothing.

Except there was _something _about it this time, as the dress fell to the floor with a quiet rustle and she stepped out it. She looked stunning even in the simple white underwear she wore, her tan skin practically glowing in contrast; and it wasn't even so much of a sexual thing as that he truly thought she was beautiful. She didn't even have to try; she was still an amazing sight to behold.

He wondered if Wes thought the same things about her, if she had shown him, if Wes would even appreciate it. And then it hit him: it shouldn't matter what Wes did or didn't do when it came to Rachel. Blaine shouldn't care. She wasn't anything to him other than a friend with whom he had fallen into some kind of fucked up agreement with; to use and be used. There weren't supposed to be any feelings or bitterness or jealousy. It wasn't supposed to be complicated.

He let out a tiny groan into his pillow, one he hoped she wouldn't hear, but when he opened his eyes again, she was looking right back at him with the deepest concern. "Hi," she whispered, slipping on a shirt that was far too big to be one of hers. "I didn't mean to wake you up."

He just shook his head, not trusting himself to say anything.

"Wes wanted to study," she explained, "or I wouldn't have come back so soon."

He nodded as if he understood, but he didn't, not really; all he could think of was if he had a real date with Rachel, he would have never cut it off short to study. Of course, he shouldn't have been on a date with Rachel. He shouldn't have anything to do with Rachel, but that didn't stop him. He wouldn't stop, especially not now and even though he knew it was wrong, that it wasn't the way things were supposed to be, he was so far tangled up in her that there was nothing he could do but try to hold on as tight as she would let him.

His eyes fluttered shut for a moment and he let out a deep breath, burrowing into his pillow as if to hide away for just a moment longer. He had meant to sit up, to try and engage with her, to talk to her like the friend he was supposed to be, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He just didn't want to know about her date, or if she had a good time, or if she would go out with Wes again. It felt like losing her and he wasn't ready for that to happen yet and he especially wasn't ready to face what that actually meant.

Something incredibly warm and fuzzy was tickling his nose and his eyes shot open only to see Rachel crawling into his bed with her pink monstrosity she called a blanket, tucking them both in as she curled into his side. She didn't try for anything else, didn't kiss him or slip her hand under his shirt or slid her knee between his legs. She just lay there, head laying on his chest as she sighed deeply, nuzzling closer to him before she went still against him. His arms wrapped around her waist, holding her as he buried his face in her hair and let the comfort she was offering wash over him in a gentle wave.

She was humming as he drifted off to sleep, feeling for the first time that whatever Rachel was to him, it was so much more than the sex they limited themselves to. She was something deeper, something real, and he didn't have the words for it yet – except maybe "complicated" - and he would have to keep it from her but in that moment, at least he was honest with himself. At least one of them knew.

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**a/n: we write, you read, you review, and we write more (and hopefully quicker next time) **


	11. Chapter 11

Rachel was attracted to three things above all others: power, charisma, and talent. Wesley seemed, on the surface, a perfect fit for her. He had the three main qualities she was looking for in a partner. He would never dream of upstaging her, and he was intelligent to boot. She had tried dating someone not dumber, per say, but not quite at Rachel's level before and it hadn't worked.

He was funny, too, she tried to remind herself as they sat in the empty senior commons for a 'study date' that Rachel was surprised to find actually meant studying, even if there were Chinese takeout containers around them and soft music playing in the background. But he'd barely made a move on her other than a few small kisses, and it drove Rachel crazy. She wasn't exactly a sex fiend, and she had Blaine when she needed a release but -

If it had been Blaine, there, sitting across from her with a smirk and a glittering hint of mischief in his eye, they'd probably have been fucking already.

But it wasn't just the sex, she realized with a start as Wesley continued to talk about some trip he had taken the previous summer with a few of the Warblers. It was the way they could still laugh and talk and joke around with one another, how even if they were sleeping together on a more than semi-regular basis, in places all around the school whenever they needed to get their hands on one another, how even if he was cheating on his boyfriend and she was supposed to be starting something with Wesley, they still managed to stay friends.

It was how he had carried her on her back across the courtyard one day so she wouldn't get slush all over her new shoes, Sebastian teasing him and calling him a mule while Blaine rolled his eyes and grinned at his boyfriend, saying that the princess of the school must be carried and while several around them offered their services, his grip had tightened around her legs as he held strong. Or how when it was two in the morning and she couldn't sleep, he'd wrap his arms around her and bury his face in her hair, his soft breathing lulling her into a calming exhaustion until sleep would win over.

It was in all the small, little ways he had somehow won her over, in a way that Wes was trying desperately to do, and with a start she knew just exactly what Quinn had been saying all along.

_Sounds like a Rachel Berry potential partner if I've ever heard of one._

It hit her like a train, the full realization of just how deeply she had somehow allowed herself to fall. It wasn't just that she never got off quite as well as she did unless his hand, mouth, or dick was somehow was involved. No, it was his laugh and his smile and the way his forehead crinkled when he was concentrating or confused. It was everything, and she was so, so screwed.

She nearly raced back to her room when Wesley seemed to be done with her for the evening, nothing more than a chaste kiss to the side of her mouth and she couldn't even begin to question why he had bothered to ask her out if he wasn't going to try and make a further move on her like the rest of the student population at Dalton wanted to, not with her mind racing with just how she could have been quite so stupid.

It was one thing to sleep with someone in a relationship, another thing entirely to fall in love with them, especially when said person wasn't even supposed to be attracted to you in the first place. There was so much stacked against her, the odds that Blaine saw her as more than a friend he got off with slim to none, and nothing made that fact more solid than the scene that awaited her when she opened her bedroom door.

It was innocent, one of the most innocent moments she'd ever seen from them at least. Blaine was simply laying with his head against Sebastian's thigh, Sebastian's long fingers running through the relatively loose hair as he copied notes down into a notebook next to him with his free hand, Blaine holding a literature book in the air as he attempted to read it, legs hanging off the edge of the bed as he kicked them anxiously.

It was serene, and even the small smile Blaine spared for her before turning back to his book seemed to turn her stomach into knots, nerves frayed as she took them in. They were happy, and she was, effectively, ruining that by sleeping with Blaine.

But she had always been a selfish person, one who took what she wanted, and even if it would hurt both of them in the long run, she wanted Blaine. She wanted him _now_, and she gave him a pointed look when he glanced up at her again before she dropped her bag on the bed.

"Have fun with captain boring?" Sebastian asked nonchalantly, turning a page in his physics book before shooting a smirk in Rachel's direction, her responding glare - though whether it was at his comment, or the mere fact that he had Blaine and she wanted him all to herself, she wasn't sure - enough to quell him into silence.

"Are you okay?" Blaine asked quietly, sitting up and leaning across the small space, placing his hand reassuringly on her knee and she wanted to swat it away or climb into his lap, but she couldn't do either with Sebastian right behind him.

"Fine," she snapped, kicking her shoes off and watching as they fell in the middle of the floor, making absolutely no movement to pick them up and move them.

"Maybe you should go," she heard Blaine whisper as she crashed backwards on her bed, turning away from them as she heard Sebastian's grunt of disapproval, feeling his stare on her back but she wasn't about to ask him to stay, not when she wanted him far, far away. She could overhear their small goodbyes, the sound of them kissing turning her stomach inside out-she'd witnessed it more than enough, but this was like a new jab in the heart.

The door opened and closed quietly, Blaine pausing by it momentarily before he was next to her in the bed, his hand on her hip as he rubbed gentle circles into the skin that had been exposed as her white button up rode up. "What's wrong?" he asked her quietly, tone soft and gentle and she shook her head, not wanting to talk. She didn't know how to tell him about this, of all things.

"Nothing," she muttered after a moment of his unrelenting gaze, trying to hide her face in her arms but his touch was sending sparks down her skin, just like it always did, and he was trying so hard, pulling her into a sitting position until their faces were at an even level as he pressed chaste kisses across her hairline.

"Talk to me, Rach," he said, keeping his voice low, "tell me what happened."

She wanted nothing more than to do that, than to give him what he wanted and to whisper the words aloud, but she couldn't find the courage that she normally seemed to have an overabundance of, couldn't find the confidence to lay it out for him, and instead she found his lips and kissed him hard, lips crashing onto his and he seemed surprised but he didn't pull back either.

And there was something new in it for her, that she either hadn't noticed before or just hadn't been present until this moment, because this wasn't just a quick fuck for her anymore. This was Blaine, her only true friend at Dalton that she was crazy about, and there was a rush of emotions behind the actions as he pulled away, tucking her hair behind her ear and searching her face for some sort of sign of what was happening.

"Rachel," he tried, but she shook her head, only pushed away by his hands locked tightly around her wrist even as she crawled into his lap, trying to forget about what her thoughts were doing, what her heart was doing. "Come on, we can't just- you're upset, obviously, so just talk to me."

"I don't want to talk," she whispered, her voice as strong as it could be as she planted kisses along his jawline. "I just want to fuck, Blaine, please," she murmured, her lips sucking hard on a pulse point as she found it.

He let out a breathy sigh, the kind she knew would have him giving in within moments, and the "Rachel, come on," wasn't nearly as convincing as it had been only a moment ago when it left his lips.

"Fuck me, Blaine," she whispered in his ear as her hips rolled forward, until all his resistance seemed completely futile. She was pushed backwards on the bed, her wrists still clamped in his grasp as he kissed her hard, her body arching into his as she tried to focus on nothing but the physical act of what was happening.

It worked well enough as he dragged his lips across her neck, the scruff from not shaving for a day rough against her soft skin, his hips grinding into hers as he seemed to try and take care of whatever she was going through internally. But it was different, because she would have never noticed that before. That even beneath the occasionally rough exterior of their fucking, there was emotions intertwined, caring and compassion and he was trying to make it _better _and it was almost sweet enough to make her stop.

But his lips caught her nipple as he pushed away fabric, plucking at the small nub until it was hard under his tongue and she was left with nothing more than soft gasps from her lips, his hands unbuttoning her shirt quickly to rid her of it as she was finally free to use her own to push his own shirt off, throwing it across the room quickly.

There were few times she had felt this desperate to be touched by him, to feel some comfort that on some level, he did want her. He wanted her badly enough to ignore that he had kicked his boyfriend out for this, to trail his hands down her sides until he could slide them up her skirt, pulling her panties off and throwing them with the rest of their clothes. That he would be willing to cheat, time and time again, at any point in time she demanded it from him. There was something in her that drew him towards her, and she could take comfort in that, even if it didn't feel like enough.

It was much harder than normal, whether from his own frustration that she wouldn't just talk to him or from her own need to just ignore the thoughts running around her mind, she wasn't sure, but he pushed into her as soon as she unbuttoned his pants and pushed them down his thighs enough to free him, his hands catching her wrists before she could stroke him for a moment as he angled himself at her entrance. Her guttural moan was only quieted by his teeth sinking into her lower lip, even as he thrust as deep inside of her as he could, Rachel's legs wrapping around his waist until he was completely sheathed inside of her.

"So hot," he murmured, biting down on her neck and for a second she worried he'd bruise her this time, he'd mark her and their months of sneaking around would be for naught because Wesley would know, without a doubt, that mark hadn't come from him, but his tongue soothed the area as he pulled back only to slam his hips back into her, Rachel's back arching off the bed as she let out another pleased groan.

She hid her face in his shoulder when she came, her nails digging sharply into his side and he followed shortly after, hands tight on her waist as he breathed heavily against her neck, placing a simple kiss against the skin before he pulled out and slumped down next to her on the bed, clearly worn out and she wondered if he and Sebastian had only been sitting so complacently when she came in because Sebastian had gotten to him first.

The thought coiled jealousy through her bloodstream again, and while they might normally lay and joke around for a few minutes, whisper and giggle and let hands explore in a less heated moment, she simply let her skirt fall back down over her thighs as she stood up to move to the bathroom and shower.

"Rachel," Blaine said, calling after her and causing her to pause momentarily at the doorway, her eyes wide as he reached out to grab at her wrist in a moment of tenderness, his fingers trailing lightly over the pulse point that was running rapid at his administrations. "Come on, talk to me. There's clearly something wrong."

"Nothing's wrong," she snapped, more harshly than she would have liked, "Wesley just isn't going to give me what I want, and you will."

The look of pain that flashed over his features at her words-so cruel, she knew, but she wasn't sure if it was because of the truth behind them or not-it pained her in a whole new way that she still wasn't ready to accept yet. "Rach-"

"I have to shower," she said, turning away from where the corner of his mouth was turning downwards, his eyes returning to their honey color as they looked at her with sadness, a sadness that ran deeper than she could explore without hurting herself more, because she couldn't do it.

She couldn't accept that she was in love with Blaine.

-:-

Blaine wasn't in the room when she reappeared, wearing far more clothes than she normally did as she crawled into her bed-the same one Blaine had been in with her only an hour prior-grabbing her cell phone and dialing Quinn's number automatically. She needed her best friend, and she hid her face in her knees to keep the tears from falling because it wasn't fair that Quinn was two hours away, unable to hug her and stroke her back and her hair and tell her it was all right.

"This better be important," Quinn snapped when she answered after a few rings, "Puckerman is looking extremely agitated."

"I think I have feelings for Blaine," she said quietly in response, and she knew by the rustling on the other end of the phone and Quinn's short bark of 'go away, Puck,' that the blonde was relocating to a more private location to help her out as best she could.

"What brought on this sudden revelation only three months too late?" Quinn teased, though her tone was soft and gentle and she could tell by the slight echo that she was probably sitting on the edge of her bathtub, Puck wandering around and poking at things in her bedroom until she returned to him.

"I-I don't know," Rachel lied, at least until a heavy sigh came from the other end of the phone and she smiled, a bit, at the overdramatic roll of Quinn's eyes she knew had happened. "I was out with Wesley and it just- clicked."

"Well it's about damn time," Quinn muttered, Rachel frowning as she picked at the hem of her pajama pants.

"A little compassion wouldn't kill you, Fabray," she remarked, Quinn chuckling on the other end of the phone because they both knew if the roles were reversed-if Rachel commented that Puck's more and more frequent appearance in Quinn's life was probably more than just a booty call situation-she wouldn't be compassionate either. It wasn't how they worked.

"I can't say I didn't see this coming from a thousand miles away," Quinn answered after a minute, "though the fact that you've managed to avoid it for this long is quite outstanding. I had no idea you were that good at repressing feelings."

Rachel rolled her eyes, letting her hair fall and surround her as she pressed her forehead against her knee with more pressure. "I just don't know what to do," she admitted. "He's supposed to be gay, and he's supposed to have a boyfriend, and yet-we fuck around more than I think he does with Sebastian, at this point. And I know I've barely done anything with Wesley at this point, and it was different the last time, Quinn, I could feel it."

"That's because he's not a meaningless fling anymore," Quinn reminded her. "Not in your head, or your heart."

"I don't know what to do," Rachel whined, shutting her eyes tight so she wouldn't cry, because she refused to. She wouldn't let this get her down, and she knew even before the words left Quinn's mouth what she had to do.

"Move on," Quinn said quietly. "He's not going to leave Sebastian for you if he hasn't yet, and you'll end up losing the one friend you have there if you continue to fall for him and he doesn't want you back. Throw yourself at Wesley and mold him to be what you want. If I recall, Rachel Berry is pretty good at that," Quinn offered, and Rachel nodded from her end of the phone, knowing that she was right. No good would come of her feelings, so she'd have to repress them, push them away and while she knew it would effectively push Blaine away, even if it was a minor push, it would be better for them in the long run.

Because Blaine was her closest friend there. Outside of their sexual relationship, he made her laugh and smile and made the day a little more bearable every time he so much as grinned at her. It was what she had realized a few hours ago, and it was what she needed to remind herself of now.

She'd focus on Wesley, on her relationship with him and just how that could blossom. She'd force him into being what she wanted until her crush on Blaine was nothing more than a distant memory, something she could joke about with Quinn in the future.

_Remember that time I was young and naive and slept with a gay guy until I was foolish enough to fall for him? _

"Move on," Rachel nodded, as if it would affirm the thought in her mind enough to actually attempt to achieve it. "I can do that."

"And if you ever need help," Quinn said with a small laugh, Rachel falling backwards on her bed with a giggle of her own.

"I think you have your hands full enough with Puckerman," she teased, but she wanted Quinn to know how much she appreciated it and her tone went from mocking to sincere as she added a small "but thank you, Quinn."

"You're welcome," Quinn promised, her own tone back to the serious one she had for the rest of their conversation. "You can do it Rachel. Just…get over him."

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**a/n:** we write, you read, you review, and we write more :D


	12. Chapter 12

There was a cold, constant pain in his stomach; it had been there for days and Blaine didn't know how to make it go away. It was there every time Rachel left early in the morning and waited until just before curfew to make it back, or when she would put her headphones on and spend the rest of the evening ignoring him or forget to say good night. She wouldn't laugh, or joke, or tease him for working too hard and insist he stop and learn how to have fun.

And she wouldn't touch him, at all; it wasn't even about the sex. He almost felt like he could live without her kiss, her hands in his hair, her breathless pleading for him to take her, if only she would just look at him again. It was as if she went out of her way to make sure they had no contact whatsoever. She waited until he was on the other side of the room to use the bathroom after him, when usually she'd be waiting at the door and squeezing past him in a hurry, her hands flat against his chest with a sly grin on her face. She would rub his shoulders as he studied until she thought he was sufficiently distracted or he would kick at her feet dangling off the bed when she tried to put her shoes on. He never realized just how used he was to feeling her skin on his until it wasn't there anymore. Until she didn't want him anymore.

It hurt, in a thousand different ways, that he was somehow losing Rachel and he couldn't do a thing to stop it. He cared for her, considered her his best friend; in a way, he loved her and in a way, that confused him more than it should have. But it didn't seem to matter to her, not if she could just use him and lock him out of her life in one fell swoop. Maybe it was his fault, for giving into her and letting himself start to believe there was more than just something physical between them. She had all but told him that this was what she did, she slept with her friends and expected them be okay with it when she threw them away for some mysterious reason that wasn't good enough to even talk to them about.

He was frustrated – with her, with himself – and the longer he had to sit there feeling hurt and confused, the more it just turned into a bitter, twisted breed of anger. He didn't like being angry with her, it made him sick, but he didn't have any other recourse. She had put this distance between them and left him no other option than to go along with it; if he didn't miss her so much, he would have hated her for it. She had been the one person in his life who didn't make him feel like he wasn't good enough. But that's how he felt now, like he was just someone she could walk out on, leave behind and move on to the next thing.

Which was apparently Wes. He couldn't understand why she suddenly wanted to spend all her time with the head Warbler. He had already proved himself to be a horrible distraction for her, someone who couldn't seem to keep track of her or read all her subtle clues like Blaine could. She as good as said Wes didn't do it for her, not like he did. Or maybe that was the attraction, because Wes didn't instantly fall for her wiles. He was a challenge Blaine had never been. Maybe that was what she really wanted, and not an easy, predictable boy who came running every time she snapped her fingers.

The part that really killed him was he had never seen Wes happier and all Blaine wanted to do was strangle him in his sleep for harboring Rachel's attentions. Everytime she smiled or laughed or her fingers reached out for his, no matter how fake or calculated Blaine could convince himself it was, Wes would light up and Blaine would begin plotting his murder and wondering if he could convince people Wes fell on his own gavel until he died. This jealousy, this snake of envy, was enough to drive Blaine insane and he was waiting for the moment when he would snap.

That moment came on a Thursday when he walked into his room, expecting to find it empty once again and instead was greeted with the image of Wes sucking Rachel's soul out through her mouth. Disgust ran through him as he watched them kiss, Rachel's hands around Wes' neck, her fingers dipping under the collar. Blaine knew this was her way of asking for more, telling him that she wanted to feel him pressed against her, wanted his knees to part her waiting legs as they fell down onto the bed, but Wes just sat there, his own arms resting politely on his waist, completely oblivious to everything Rachel was silently begging him for.

She seemed to sense Blaine in the room and her eyes fluttered open, locking onto his while Wes, blissfully unaware, continued to kiss her. And she let him, which was the worst part of all. She couldn't take her eyes off Blaine, but she could let her mouth fall open to meet Wes' and pretend like nothing she and Blaine had done even mattered.

"You have your own room, you know?" Blaine snapped, throwing his book bag noisily against the wall, wishing he had more of an excuse to throw it at Wes' head.

Wes withdrew his arms from around Rachel, his expression puzzled as Blaine continued to glare at him from across the room. "David is doing yoga," Wes explained with a nervous chuckled, "or rather, he's desperately trying to and it's taking up out entire room. He had somewhat of a crisis when the button on his blazer fell off, even though I think it was just inadequate stitch-"

"Wes? I don't care," Blaine interrupted. "I have to study and I can't do that if you're in here trying to work up the nerve to shove your hand up Berry's shirt."

"Blaine!" Rachel gasped, and he couldn't help but glare openly at her instead; apparently that's what it took to her her attention after hardly being on her radar at all.

"What?" he yelled even as she cringed away from him. "You and I both know it's only a matter of time before yours are down his pants."

"I think that's enough," Wes said in a clipped voice as he stood from Rachel's bed. "You shouldn't speak to her that way. It's unfitting for a gentleman like you, and what's more, it's unfitting for a Warbler."

"I don't give a shit!" Blaine shouted, pointing wildly towards the door. "Get the fuck out of my room."

"I'm concerned about you..." but Blaine wasn't listening to Wes and his concerns, he was watching Rachel, who was curled up on her bed, staring at him with wide eyes; there were tears in them, lurking just under the surface and he knew that if no one else were there but the two of them, she would let herself cry them. All he wanted was to push Wes out of the way, to crawl on top of her pink comforter and pull her into his lap. He would apologize a thousand times, beg her to forgive him, tell her he hadn't meant it. That he was just hurt and he missed her and he wanted her back, like they were before when she wasn't shutting him out. When she wasn't slowly killing him inside.

When she slid off the bed, he thought for a moment that maybe she understood him again, they way she always seemed to before he could say the words, but her wavering eyes hardened into steel and she wrapped her small hand around Wes' arm, her voice as cold as he'd ever heard it. "Wesley, we're clearly not welcome here," she said, her eyes scorching as they meet Blaine's, "and as ridiculous as it is for me to give up _my room_, I won't sit here and listen to him assassinate your character."

Wes seemed unsure, but Rachel insisted and before he even had a chance to try to convince her to stay there with him, to fix whatever was broken between them, she was out the door on Wes' arm and Blaine was, once again, left alone. But it was like he could still feel her on his skin, surrounding him, closing in. Her eyes were all he could see when he closed his eyes, her voice was all he heard when he tried to scream just to get rid of some of the frustration that had been boiling in his blood all week long. Even in the shower, no matter how hard he scrubbed or punched at the hard tile, she was still there, a ghost in his soul.

-:-

There was a knock on his door after dinner – which Blaine skipped – and he didn't give it a moment's thought as he jumped off her bed, throwing the door open in a vain hope that she had come back to him only to have his heart sink like a stone in his chest when he was met with disheveled tawny hair, jade and emerald eyes as Sebastian leaned against the frame, his every present smirk twisting the corners of his lips.

"Miss me?" he asked, his eyebrows quirking suggestively for just a split-second before he had grabbed Blaine by the waist, kicking the door shut behind them as he pressed Blaine's back against the wall, lips crashing onto his before Blaine even had a chance to react. Sebastian's tongue wound it's way into Blaine's mouth, forcing it open and Blaine couldn't help the automatic response his body had to sigh into it, to invite him in.

But as good as it felt, it didn't feel right. Sebastian's lips were chapped from lacrosse practice, his hands coarse as they slid against his skin and all Blaine wanted was to feel Rachel's soft lips against his, pleading, demanding, needing all at once. He wanted to hear her giggle as he reminded her they had to be quiet, to feel her warm breath against his neck when she pulled away for air. He just wanted her and it didn't matter that Sebastian was his boyfriend because at the moment, he was just a poor substitute for Rachel.

"Seb," he whispered against his lips, "I'm not in the mood for this."

"That's what foreplay is for," Sebastian muttered, going in for another kiss but Blaine turned his head; with a deep sigh, Sebastian dropped his hands from Blaine's chest and stepped away, rolling his eyes as he crossed his arms in front of him. "Okay, fine, we'll talk first. What's wrong?"

Blaine swallowed, a lump sticking in his throat. "I don't want to talk either," he said quietly, shuffling glumly over to his side of the room, leaning against his bed. "I just... I'm sorry, I just want to be left alone."

"Tough," Sebastian shrugged, sitting in Blaine's desk chair as he stared at him. "When you turned me into your boyfriend, that gave me a free pass into any alone time you might want to have."

"You can't help with this," Blaine murmured apologetically, hoisting himself up on his bed and laying down, covering his head with a pillow. Sebastian only made things worse, and Blaine wanted to cry because this was not how he was supposed to be thinking of his boyfriend. He was supposed to be the one make him feel better, to remind him in some little way why this whole thing with Rachel had gotten completely out of hand and that Sebastian was the only one Blaine really wanted. In reality, Blaine was a terrible boyfriend and he didn't deserved the hand trying to comfort him as it rubbed slow circles into his back. "Please, just go Sebastian."

"You're being kind of pathetic," Sebastian chuckled, slapping Blaine on the ass suddenly, causing him to jerk up. "Come on, we're sneak out and go to Scandals. I'll cheer you up there."

And like so much that had already happened that day, Blaine didn't feel in control of himself as he threw his pillow at Sebastian's turned back as he shouted, "I said just leave me alone okay?"

"What is your fucking problem?" Sebastian hissed at him. "You're in a shit mood, I get it, but you don't get to take it out on me."

"Well you're not listening to me."

"You're not saying anything!"

"What do you want to hear?" Blaine shouted. "Do you want to know how I feel like everything is falling apart around me and because I can't do anything to fix it, I just find ways to deliberately make them worse? And that I can't even get a minute to think because you come in here and demand I be happy at the flip of a switch and then there's Wes and Rachel going at it in here and I just... I can't handle them right now either."

Sebastian just looked at him, unblinking, and suddenly he was laughing again. Usually Blaine could appreciate how quickly Sebastian could go from one extreme to the other, but in this case, it only served to annoy him further. "Wes and Rachel?" he chortled, practically clutching his stomach. "You've got to be kidding me."

"It's not funny Sebastian," Blaine snapped, but he didn't seem to notice.

"It's pretty funny," Sebastian argued, flashing Blaine his typical grin, though Blaine could only roll his eyes in response. "Come one, who could have seen that coming? Though I'm not sure what your problem with it is. Wes isn't even your type."

"I'm not- this has- Wes has nothing to do with it!" Blaine stammered.

"Then why are you so pissed off? It's not like it's about Rachel." Blaine didn't answer him, but his eyes flickered across the room to Rachel's bed and something must have passed over his face, something he was tired of trying to hide, and when his gaze finally fell back to Sebastian, his boyfriend had the most peculiar look on his face, as if something had occurred to him that he couldn't quite make sense of. "Unless, it is. Unless it's not Rachel you're jealous of for hooking up with Wes, it's her you're jealous for."

Panic welled up inside him, washing out any kind of rationality Blaine still had left; because it was true, he was incredibly jealous of Wes, because he wanted Rachel and all the times where he had had her didn't matter. He just wanted her back, no Wes, no Sebastian, just Blaine and Rachel. But he couldn't say this to Sebastian, he wouldn't understand and, more than just that, he didn't deserve to be hurt like that, to be blindsided with this thing Blaine had going on with her that he couldn't explain anymore.

"That's ridiculous, I'm not jealous for Rachel." The lie spilled from his mouth like it was second nature, but he could tell Sebastian didn't believe him as he scoffed loudly, his teeth gritting together.

"You're a liar," Sebastian retorted, throwing the pillow on the floor back at Blaine, hitting him hard in the face. "You have a thing for Rachel."

"I don't have a thing!" Blaine yelled, jumping off his bed to stand in front of Sebastian, who merely took a step back. "For God's sake Sebastian, she's a girl and I'm gay."

"So the fuck what?" Sebastian growled at him. "I'm gay and I've fucked around with girls too. It's a label, it can change without the world ending. Gay means nothing to me, but what does means something to me is the fact that you're so hard up for your goddamn roommate that I can't get a pass in edgewise."

"Oh, so because I don't want to have sex one time," Blaine replied angrily, letting his ire take over any feelings of guilt he might have had, "I'm suddenly a prude? You fucked me in the shower two nights ago Sebastian!"

"Yeah, when you came over so desperate you actually begged for it," Sebastian shouted, "and I knew something was wrong and I even asked you, remember that? God, you know, I should have seen this coming. You're so predictable; I knew you had a weakness for talented loudmouths and clearly, it doesn't matter who it is anymore, so long as someone like that is around to fuck you."

"Nothing has even happened!" It was as if the world came to a halt – Blaine wasn't even sure that Sebastian was breathing. Because it had been a mistake to say that; it sounded too much like an admittance and he knew Sebastian had heard it that way; that Blaine did have feelings for Rachel, that he was right. For a moment, Blaine wondered if he should just get it over with now, if he should just tell Sebastian they truth and let it be whatever it would be. He was so tired of all of this, of feeling like he was being pulled between two different people; but at least Sebastian wanted him, at least he could stay there and fight with him about this.

"You mean it hasn't happened yet," Sebastian said, his voice barely a whisper as he turned away and walked towards the door. "Well don't let me stop you. Fuck Rachel, fuck Wes, fuck yourself. I don't even care anymore."

"Sebastian, wait," Blaine said, but he couldn't bring himself to move towards the door, to stop him from walking out. So he didn't, just watched Sebastian leave and slam the door behind him, shattering whatever resemblance of a relationship they might have still had; were they really breaking up? Blaine wasn't sure, it just felt so unfinished, so unclear. He should have raced after him, should have confessed to everything, found some kind of closure, or plead with Sebastian to let him fix it, just this one thing where he might have a chance to turn things around. But his knees gave out and he sunk to the floor, the last bit of energy he might have still had just disappearing.

-:-

The cuff of his blazer was frayed from where he'd been picking at it all night, still sitting on the floor and he couldn't find a reason why he should bother getting up, not even when Rachel stormed in after curfew, her hair flying behind her in a rage as she started yelling at him too, demanding he explain himself and apologize for shouting at Wes. He knew he would have too, and he knew he would, but he couldn't do it tonight. Because if he tried to move, tried to pretend and be the perfect Blaine Anderson everyone expected of him, he felt he might actually lose his mind.

It wasn't until Rachel, in the middle of her tirade, started throwing around words like "you're not my boyfriend" that he shook himself out of his daze, his entire body starting to shake as he screamed back at her. "I know! I'm nothing right? Just an easy fuck at your beck and call, and it doesn't matter if this has ruined the only good things I have in my life, as long as you're okay with it at the end of the day. That's how it goes, right?"

"What are you talking about?" she questioned, her eyes wide with sudden concern; she knelt down in front of him, worrying her lip between her teeth, and he hated how well he knew her, that this meant she was just as insecure over this as he was. She was drowning in this too and it dawned on him that Wes was her way of trying to stay afloat. She had been protecting herself, just like he should have been, but instead he just fell in so deep he didn't know which way was up anymore.

She reached out for him, as if to cup his cheek, but he shied away from her this time, folding his arms around his knees and rested his forehead against them. He took a shaky breath, could feel it rattling down his spine. "I'm so sorry," he muttered, his voice catching in his throat. "I don't know how things got so fucked up."

He could feel her settled down next to him, her gaze on the back of his neck. "Did something happen with Sebastian?" she whispered fearfully. He wanted to laugh, to cry, to forget words and communicating and fall back into her arms until he couldn't remember his own name; but they couldn't do that anymore, not with the way things were now. They had to talk, to speak and listen, to understand.

"We had a fight," Blaine said numbly, unable to look at her, "and it was about you. About how I feel about you," and he prayed she wouldn't ask him what that was, because he couldn't even begin to understand it himself. It was something real, and tangible, and it had nearly consumed him the past couple of day, but _what _it actually was – lust, like, love – he just didn't know. "He doesn't know though, about us and what we've been doing."

He turned his head too chance a glance at her, finding her in nearly the same position as he was, curled up in a ball, her head resting against her knees. "We don't even know what we're doing anymore," she sighed heavily. "Which is why I had to stop it Blaine. I should have explained things to you. I didn't mean to hurt you but I can't do this anymore, not when... you have to choose."

She was right; he'd known this for weeks, but he kept putting it off and hiding it away, hoping that he could ignore it and it would disappear. It was an impossible choice. If he let Rachel go, he feared he would lose her entirely, but he'd been with Sebastian so long, and as volatile as he could be, he was safe. "I don't know what to do," he admitted, fully aware of how pathetic he must sound to her. "Just tell me what to do, please?"

"I can't," she shook her head adamantly. "I can't do that for you any more than you can do that for me."

"Don't you understand that you're what makes this so hard?" he pleaded. "I think about you constantly, and I miss you when you're gone. It kills me when you don't talk to me, and I have no idea why and I know it wasn't supposed to be this way, but it is now and you just... how do I know you care? You give me all these questions without any answers."

She didn't say a word and she refused to look at him, staring blankly ahead as he continued. "I can't leave Sebastian for this," he said, "when I don't even know what this is. At least with him, I know how he feels. And I know I'm selfish, but how can I give that up when you can't even tell me if this thing between us means something to you?"

A small sound escaped her, a choked sob or a strangled scream, and he thought for a moment that this could be it. That they would finally figure everything out, that this would end one way or another. But when she looked up at him and he could see her face, he could see her mask slip into place, perfectly in control. "If I tell you that now," she said, her voice so steady, she could have been talking about the weather instead of mangling his heart, "it will just muddle everything up even more."

"It's already muddled," he whispered, but he knew she wouldn't say another word about it and they were no closer to ending this than they had been when it started. He almost wished she would run away, disappear and let him fall to pieces on his own, but her hand found his and as much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, the feeling of her fingers wrapped around his was such a relief. She was there, and as they both sat on the hard floor in silence, he at least had that.

* * *

**AN: **Hey guys! Sorry it took us - well me, Kira - so long to get this chapter up, but we're close to the end now with only two chapters left. We hope you still enjoy it.

_we write, you read, you review, and we write more. ~Ashley and Kira_


	13. Chapter 13

In the end, 'moving on' was far easier said than done.

She had tried, to her credit, to do just that. She had pulled back from Blaine, had thrown herself into Wesley, but it only seemed to break and fracture them more day by day. She hadn't missed his sad looks, the glances that did nothing more than break her heart every chance they got, but he didn't seem able to come talk to her about it anymore than she had gone to him.

It was supposed to be easier, this way. It was supposed to be a clean break, the simple solution. You couldn't get over someone you were constantly with on a regular basis, so she hid in the library, in Wesley's room, anywhere Blaine wasn't. She would duck into their room at the last possible moment, stay on her side and generally avoid him, but it wasn't working.

For all the time she spent with Wesley's mouth moving against her own, his hands always staying firmly over her clothing and never wandering too far into places Rachel didn't even want him to go, she thought of Blaine. She would remember the times they had hidden in supply closets, the locker rooms, the library, the Warbler hall. Stolen moments, quick fucks or even quicker kisses, small laughs and private jokes and the way his eyes shined when they looked at her.

By the time they finally broke, screaming at each other loud enough that anyone passing by could rightfully figure out what they were arguing about, she was coming to the conclusion that there was no hope. She couldn't force herself to move on, and she certainly couldn't seem to transfer her emotions for Blaine over to Wesley, despite how hard she had tried. Wesley was great, probably even better for her in an alternate universe, but she didn't want him.

She wanted the boy she ended up sitting on the ground with, fingers interlocked while they tried to figure out how badly they had fucked up their lives together.

And it was both of them who had screwed up; Rachel for initiating everything in the first place and Blaine for chasing after it, and everything was so much more convoluted than she had ever expected. It had started out as a test of sorts, a way to get over her attraction and move on, and here she was stuck in an almost relationship of sorts with a boy who had a boyfriend.

One good thing came out of their conversation, if nothing else. She knew that even if he was just as confused as she was, there was something more to it than just sex for him. That he had fallen for her just as she had done for him, that they were both in this mess.

But they weren't in it together, not yet, not until he decided if he wanted to keep Sebastian or keep her and she couldn't make his choice for him. She didn't even want to make him choose in the first place, hated that if he gave up one he'd have to lose the other, even if only for a bit, but there wasn't another way around it. If Sebastian even suspected the slightest infidelity between them, everything else could collapse around them like a house of cards built in the sand, their months of secrecy and lies that they had managed to keep quiet so well destroyed from one stupid mistake.

Staying away was nearly impossible with the two of them sharing a room and it took Rachel until Friday night to decide what she had to do. It went against every instinct in her body, but she had to lay it out on the line for him, had to tell him how she felt so that he had all the options laid out in front of him, her feelings on the line as much as Sebastian's, as much as Blaine's, everyone just as open and vulnerable as they could possibly be.

There was no way she could say it face to face, she would chicken out and try and seduce him by way of trying to express herself, almost by second nature, as if she would be able to go _please, just sleep with me, let me show you how deeply I care about you the only way I really know_, but it wasn't an option anymore. She was going to have to grow up, face facts, and admit her feelings.

A letter would suffice for now.

She waited until he was gone, disappeared to god only knew where - she would assume one of his various clubs or activities, but he could have already made his decision, gone back to Sebastian and hoped Rachel would figure it out without a proper explanation, but she refused to back out now. It was almost a challenge to herself, to see if she could do this, and she sat down at her desk with a blank piece of paper in front of her, pen in hand, willing the words to flow out of her.

She scratched out _Dear Blaine_ about five times before she settled on a fresh piece of paper, simply addressing it _Blaine_, before hovering her pen an inch above the paper and closing her eyes, letting all the emotions she'd been feeling fall free without inhibition.

_You said that you couldn't leave Sebastian without a reason, without any explanation of anything from me. I understand your hesitation, of course, but I would hope that you could understand mine as well._

_This wasn't supposed to turn out like this. I think we can both agree that somewhere along the lines, things got far more complicated than either of us desired. What was supposed to be something fun, used for stress relief, a way to burst out of your bubble and a way for me to keep my head on straight in a school where I'm still wildly out of place, it was a comfort thing as much as it was anything else._

_But somewhere along the lines, that changed. I think it did for both of us. You haven't said anything about what it is you're feeling, but I'm sure I can venture a guess if it's anything like what I've been panicking about and why I've been pushing you away._

_I was trying to help us, Blaine, trying to find that common ground of friendship and fuck buddies who wanted nothing more than that from one another. It's been so long since I've grown emotionally attached to someone like I have with you that I didn't notice it for what it was at first, until I was already attempting to latch onto Wesley as a lifeboat. I think I would have agreed to go out with anyone who wasn't you, just to prove to myself that I could._

_I suppose this is my complicated, beating around the bush way of saying what shouldn't take more than a couple simple words. But I've never said them before, to anyone, aloud or on paper, and meant them quite the way I do with you, which may be why I turned my back from it for so long before it gave me no choice but to acknowledge it._

_I love you, Blaine. In a way that drives me crazy, because I wasn't supposed to. You're my only true friend here at Dalton, and I screwed that up the only real way I know how to, and then went and fucked it all up even more when I started to fall for you. And I'm sorry, for coming in and turning your life upside down like I have. You had everything before I got here; and I feel more than partially responsible for taking part in the destruction in quite a few arenas._

_You have a choice to make. I don't want to influence you one way or the other, but you deserved to have all the facts, to make an informed decision. I know you care deeply about Sebastian, that he was-is-your boyfriend. That you never meant to hurt him, despite your mutual participation in all this. And if you choose him, I wouldn't blame you. He's safe, like you said, stable, something secure you can hold onto._

_But know that if you did choose me, I could learn to be all those things for you too. I may not know much about normal relationships, but I know that I want to be all that and more for you. I know that, in some aspects, I already am._

_I'm going to Quinn's until Sunday to give you the space we need to clear our minds. If you make a decision before then, feel free to call and let me know._

_Love,_

_Rachel_

She attached a gold star after her name, almost on instinct, wiping away the tears as she reread what she had written before securing the letter in an envelope and placing it on his pillow, grabbing her overnight bag and locking their dorm room behind her as she slipped out to drive back to Lima for the time being.

-:-

Quinn was ready and waiting for her by the time Rachel arrived, nerves frazzled and she couldn't stop staring at her phone, waiting for something. A call, a text, an email - anything that told her anything he was thinking. A simple _yes _or _no _would have even sufficed, but she knew that even if he had gotten her letter and read it already, he wouldn't be calling just yet.

Quinn took her phone after the first hour, refusing to give it back as she hid it in a shoe box on the top shelf of her closet where Rachel couldn't reach, before pulling her onto the bed and demanding that the two take a night to do nothing but watch movies, curled around one another for the simplistic need of comfort and feeling like someone, somewhere, wanted to be around you.

And it was nice, for a little while, to have someone's arms wrapped around her and playing with her hair while the crushing feeling of doom was upon her.

There was little sleep for her that night, Quinn snoring softly next to her as she stared at the pristine white ceiling of her friend's room, thoughts racing through her mind. What Blaine was thinking or if he was trying to talk to her about everything, if she had made a mistake in running after she came clean, if she should have stayed, if she should have fought for him or let him go.

It wasn't until almost four in the morning that she finally snuck out of Quinn's bed, climbing on top of her desk chair to reach into the shoe box only to find no messages on her phone.

Disappointment washed over her before she could help it, grabbing a blanket and curling up on the floor to stare at a blank phone screen devoid of anything that she wanted to appear in front of her. For all she knew, he had spent the night in Sebastian's room, trying to make up with him, trying to push her behind and lock her away in a box and didn't even know she was gone.

For all she knew, he didn't give two fucks that she was in love with him.

Quinn must have found her on the floor, for when she woke up she was tangled in blankets on the soft bed once more, Quinn singing along in the kitchen as she bustled around, the smell of eggs and tofu-bacon wafting up the flight of stairs until Rachel was tempted enough to follow it to the source, her eyes rimmed red from tears as Quinn held onto her for a moment.

"No mourning today," she demanded, feeding her a piece of bacon before she was a blur of blonde hair zooming around the kitchen, handing Rachel a glass of juice and a plate of food before helping herself. "If you're visiting me for the weekend, we're going to actually have fun."

Rachel raised a skeptical eyebrow, but offered a small smile regardless, and Quinn seemed to take that as enough of an acceptance to take the phone sticking out of the band of Rachel's sweats, putting it on the counter and glaring when Rachel moved to grab ahold of it once more.

"Give him time," she reprimanded. "It's a big decision he has to make, and the last thing you want is to rush him. If he's smart, he'll come to his senses and realize how wonderful you are. If he isn't, well, I'm sure Puck can fix that."

She let out a genuine laugh at that, the image of Puck's surprise at how strong Blaine actually was enough to distract her from her seemingly constant pain, and she nodded in agreement. "Then I guess I'm all yours for the day," Rachel shrugged, and Quinn smiled in response, stealing a piece of Rachel's bacon.

"Just what I was hoping to hear."

The thing was, Rachel had spent so much of her time around guys that she forgot how nice it was to spend the day in her pajamas, curled up on the couch with Quinn watching old musicals and singing along in funny voices. They did their nails, Quinn curled Rachel's hair until it bounced and Rachel helped Quinn clean her closet of clothes she never wore anymore, trying on things they hadn't fit in in years and giggling the entire time.

And even when Quinn alerted Rachel to change and prepare for the inevitable - Puck and Finn finding out she was hiding away in Lima, bound to come over and harass her about leaving them for Dalton once more - she was happy. Happier than she would have been hiding in corners and empty rooms around her school, at the very least.

She was greeted with a loud "Berry!" and lifted into arms until her feet were off the floor, loud squeaks falling out of her mouth as Puck swung her around before passing her off to Finn, who put her back on the ground and ruffled her hair as if she was a kindergartner, a look of disgust crossing her features until Quinn linked arms with her and declared that the pizza had been ordered and they were absolutely not, under any circumstances, watching action movies again.

It was almost like the old days, before her dads had moved her away from her friends, the four of them hanging out, and she felt a pang of longing for McKinley when more of the New Directions showed up, everyone happy to see her despite her new allegiance to the Warblers'.

Mike teased her that they were forcing him to sing now, Tina rolling her eyes before placing a kiss on his cheek and promising that he was getting better; Santana declaring that they didn't need her to wipe the floor with those blazers the Dalton students were forced to wear even as she smirked in Rachel's direction, downright friendly for her; Brittany asking if she was a boy now because she went to Dalton.

For a little while, Rachel could forget that she was waiting to find out where she stood with Blaine, waiting to hear a 'yes' or a 'no' on if she had just ruined her only real friendship at Dalton to act on her lust, and it wasn't until Quinn slipped her phone back in the back pocket of her jeans for her that she even thought to check on it.

But suddenly it weighed too much on her mind, her laughter not coming as easily and everything seemed so stifling. So much had changed since she had run away to Dalton; and she slipped out to Quinn's back porch for fresh air, trying to collect her thoughts.

She was staring at a blank screen - because of course, he still hadn't messaged her, and she had no idea why she had expected any differently - when Finn, of all people, came outside and sat next to her on the wooden steps she had hidden herself away in.

"It's not like Rachel Berry to hide from being the center of attention," he joked, bumping his knee into hers until she gave him a small smile, her shoulders moving up and down in a halfhearted shrug. "Something wrong?"

"I don't know yet," she answered truthfully, waving her phone around for a second. "I'm waiting to hear."

"Blaine?" Her head snapped in his direction, Finn's chuckle quiet in the darkness of the outside. "Quinn said something to Puck, and he said something to me."

"Great, so now it's running around McKinley too," she muttered, hanging her head in her hands as she let out a groan of frustration.

Finn was silent for a minute, and Rachel had almost completely forgotten he was there before he spoke again, his voice calm and quiet and she was reminded of a time when he had been the first real friend she had had, before hormones and feelings had nearly derailed them entirely as well. "You really like him, don't you?"

She didn't say anything, just looked across Quinn's yard and into her neighbors, watching the way the wind pushed one of the swings on their swing set in the small light from their own back porch. Because she did, so much, and she didn't know how to word that aloud to the boy who had been her first kiss, her first everything, even if they were just friends now.

"If he's important to you, you have to fight for him Rach."

"I did," she said quietly, running her hands down her legs and resting her chin on her knees. "I laid it out, Finn. I told him I loved him and he had to make a choice between me and Sebastian, and he's going to choose Sebastian."

"You don't know that," Finn contradicted, tone firm and sure. "Sebastian, from what I hear, he's probably the safer choice. But since when have you ever been the safer option?"

She let out a small snort at that, a small smile teasing her lips as she looked at him. "I can be a lot to handle," she admitted, Finn rolling his eyes in an overly dramatic fashion as he shot her a smile.

"I didn't say that!" he joked, but she bumped her shoulder into his, laughing quietly and listening as it echoed around the yard. "For what it's worth, he's an idiot if he doesn't pick you."

She smiled widely at him, kissing his cheek and whispering a small 'thank you' before holding her hand out to him, standing up and pulling him with her. "Now, I think there's a party that I'm supposed to be involved in," she laughed, dragging him back inside with her.

-:-

"Are you sure you're ready to go back?" Quinn asked on Sunday night as Rachel threw her overnight bag in the backseat of her car, leaning against it for a moment as she shrugged.

"I don't really have a choice," she sighed, trying to ignore the silence she was still receiving on her phone. "I'll get in trouble if I miss curfew, and my dads are in town and they'll know if I'm here too."

Quinn chewed on her lip, glancing at where Rachel's eye line kept glancing towards her phone. "You're going to be okay," she finally said, and Rachel nodded, though she wasn't so sure herself. "And just remember, Puck can go after him at any time you want."

"I know," Rachel said, pulling Quinn in for a hug, breathing in the slight vanilla the girl always seemed to smell like as she kissed her cheek. "Thanks for letting me crash for the weekend."

"Call me the second you get back?" Quinn asked, sounding nervous and worried and Rachel squeezed her wrist before nodding.

"The second I'm on campus."

"And…tell me what happens?"

Rachel hesitated briefly before she nodded, trying her best to look as optimistic as possible even if her insides were squirming with nerves and terror, unsure of what she'd meet when she got back to her dorm.

"Bye, Quinn," she said, trying to sound as light and carefree as she could before slipping into her car and driving off, the blonde waving from her driveway until Rachel couldn't see her out of her rearview mirror anymore, and she tried to tune out everything else by blasting music. There was no use dwelling over why Blaine hadn't talked to her all weekend, she figured.

She'd know soon enough anyways.

* * *

**AN: **Hey guys! We're so sorry for the wait but Ashley had some real life things happen and it was hard to find the time to sit down and really work on this. But we're getting towards the end here - just one chapter left! - and we really truly intend on wrapping this up very soon.

In the mean time, because we always get requests for fluff (and for some reason we're really not that good at it) Ashley and I have started an RP on tumblr that we're both very proud of. It's a college-based AU and we'd love for you to be a part of it. We've linked it on our profile if you're interested.

Until next time, _we write, you read, you review, and we'll write more. ~Kira and Ashley_


	14. Chapter 14

Blaine had been called out of classes early on Friday, his father dragging him to a business dinner, an incredibly dull distraction that meant he spent his time acting like a proper, Dalton-bred son so his father could win investment promises from men too old to breathe without wheezing; by the time it was over, it was too late to bother driving back to Westerville. Back to fighting with Sebastian, to the uncomfortable impasse that was between him and Rachel, to the dorm room that was somehow too big and too small at the same time. Not that his own master sized suite at his house was much better: too cold, too impersonal now that he'd been away so long. He couldn't look over and see Rachel sleeping, the blankets kicked off her legs and her shirt riding up her back as she turned over. He couldn't turn the other way and see the collage of photos he had of Sebastian, smiling after a lacrosse win, on vacation, in bed and half awake.

He knew the problem wasn't with either of them, that it was his fault for lying and cheating, for being unable to restrain himself or make up his mind. Except he had, on some level. Almost. He knew he couldn't keep the truth from Sebastian any longer, that he deserved more than he was getting from him. It wasn't right, it wasn't fair, and even though Blaine was going to lose him, it was the price he was going to have to pay if he wanted this whole mess to end. In the wee hours of Saturday morning, before the sun had even come up, he was resolved to tell Sebastian everything, and let the pieces fall where they could.

The only thing left was Rachel and the unanswered questions were more terrifying than the impending crash of his supposedly stable relationship he was about to call to an end. It said more than he was prepared to understand, that he was more concerned about her than he was Sebastian, but it had been like that for months now. She was in his skin, his blood, his head, like a siren singing his name until he crashed among the rocks. She was treacherous and beautiful and he couldn't deny himself around her, or the way she made him feel. There was a warmth in her eyes, a secret in her smile, and when she let him in, everything in his world make sense.

The hardest part was thinking he didn't do the same for her; because if he knew she did, if he knew this was truly more than just physical contact and the sense of having a warm body around, then he knew he was selfish enough to demand it from her. That he couldn't be with her if they couldn't have all of it, and it made the guilt and the deceit feel even worse somehow that he couldn't know it was all for a purpose, for something real. But he was in too deep and he had to find a way out, with or without her.

The first step was Sebastian, and his heart broke just thinking about it as he drove back to Dalton that afternoon; but it was time. He practiced in his head the entire drive back, but nothing sounded right. They all just hurt, and he panicked, wondering if he was really ready for this. He wasn't, at all, but... he was tired of running and hiding, of doing things just because they were easier, or they hurt less. He wasn't a brave person, by any means, but he could do this. He had to do this.

Still, he was more than surprised to find Sebastian waiting for him in his room, perched on the edge of his bed, glaring at Rachel's perfectly made bed like he might set it on fire at any moment. It was more than a little unnerving, any shred of confidence he'd managed to construct slipping away as he dropped his overnight bag by his closet before trying to sit next to his boyfriend. Sebastian slid off the bed before Blaine could even say a word, recoiling from him and a thousand scenarios ran through his head, the worst being that Rachel had told Sebastian on her own, without talking to Blaine. That she had decided she was done as quickly as she started, and she was just tying up loose ends.

"Okay, you're still mad at me," Blaine sighed, the weight of it settling on his shoulders seemed to make it even harder.

"Mad?" Sebastian spat, the word sounding like a poison coming from him. "No, mad was what I was when you implied you wanted to sleep with Rachel. Pissed is what I was when I found out you have slept with Rachel. Fucking livid is what I am now, now that I know you've been fucking around on me for months and lying about it to my face."

Blaine's heart dropped, Sebastian's raised voice rattling through his bones. "I don't-," he stammered, anything he might have tried to remember from his sessions in the car abandoning him and disappearing. "What are you-?"

"I read her letter," he snapped, glaring as if daring Blaine to deny it. He wouldn't, except...

"What letter?" he asked before he could catch himself, knowing that it sounded like he was playing dumb even if he truly had no idea what Sebastian was talking about. He hadn't written a letter to Rachel, and if he had, it wouldn't have been said anything about them sleeping together. Unless it was her letter, to him, but he didn't have one of those either. He glanced at Rachel's bed again, ignoring the anger in Sebastian's eyes, realizing that there was no way she had slept in it the night before, that she had gone. And apparently had left a letter behind, one that Sebastian found. "I swear I have no idea what-"

"Oh I know," Sebastian cut him off, unfolding a ball of crumpled up papers in his palm. "It was signed, sealed, and delivered to your pillow. Your girlfriend's as big a coward as you are. Allow me to read my favorite parts to you, if you don't mind. Actually, I don't give a fuck if you do."

Blaine could see Sebastian's hands shaking as he found whatever he was looking for on the papers in his hand, and Blaine could just make out Rachel's dainty scrawl before Sebastian started reading, his voice tight and clipped with sarcasm. "_I was trying to help us, Blaine, trying to find that common ground of friendship and fuck buddies who wanted nothing more than that from one another – S_he's a saint, really, classy girl you picked there. Oh, and this part, it's quite sweet - _I know you care deeply about Sebastian, that he was-is-your boyfriend. That you never meant to hurt him, despite your mutual participation in all this. And if you choose him, I wouldn't blame you. - _I mean, I guess I should thank her for giving me permission to exist right?"

"Sebastian-."

"I am not done!" he yelled and Blaine couldn't help but feel like he'd been thrown against the wall for all the rage in Sebastian's voice. They had fought before, said worse things to each other, but he'd never been like this before and Blaine wasn't even sure what he could do but sit down and take it. "You fucking lied to me Blaine! Which fine, we lie to each other all time, but I _asked _you about this and you said nothing was going on and I fucking believed you because that's what you've always needed from me. I've spent the last year killing myself on how to be a goddamn boyfriend because you needed that from me and if all you wanted was a tight little ass to fuck-."

"It's not like that!"

"I know it's not fucking like that because it says so in her goddamn letter!"

"I don't know what you want me to say," Blaine muttered as he stared at his hands. This had not gone at all like he'd planned and he was feeling somehow ever smaller and more useless than he'd ever imagined. He knew Sebastian would be angry, that he would yell and it would come down to this, but he thought he would at least appear to be a little stronger than this, that he would at least get to be the one to admit his own betrayal. Somehow, he felt like it would have made a difference.

"I don't want you to say anything," Sebastian asserted angrily, crushing Rachel's letter in his hand. "Everything that comes out of your mouth is a lie and I deserve a lot of things, but I don't have to listen to your hypocritical bullshit anymore. How many fights did we have about this, about you feeling like I was flirting too much or coming on too strong. I backed off to make you comfortable and the irony of it all is that you're the one who fucked around on me!"

"It wasn't intentional!" Blaine yelled back as his patience snapped in him. "I didn't even- it's not like we planned any of this. One minute I'm fighting with you and the next, she's on her knees with my dick in her mouth. And it just escalated and I'm sorry, but it's not like we were ever this perfect couple."

"Well if that's your excuse for cheating on me, if that's what's make it okay," Sebatian sneered, "then I guess getting trashed in Paris is my excuse for letting Rafe fuck me in the bathroom the day before I came back."

"You- what?" Blaine couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice as he blinked up at Sebastian, a flash of rage and betrayal heating up inside of him. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"You don't get to ask me that question!" Sebastian hissed, his cheeks a bright red as his temper rose even more. And Blaine knew he was right, that he had no right to be angry with him for doing the same thing Blaine had been doing to him, but reason and rationale did nothing to calm him, his guilt only making it worse; it was only because he knew Sebastian so well that he could see the way his eyes flickered to the side, the way his jaw set slightly to the left and Blaine could see the hint of a lie in Sebastian's face. He couldn't tell what it was exactly, maybe all of it, maybe only part of it, and he knew Sebastian had a tendency to protect himself by being as awful as possible, but it didn't matter anymore. They were fucked, over and done with and there was nothing either of them could do at this point to fix it.

"Now who's the fucking liar?" he challenged anyway, not caring if Sebastian knew he'd been caught or if he thought it was merely Blaine throwing his words back in his face. "Why are we doing this to each other then?"

"We're not," Sebastian said, his voice as cold as Blaine had ever heard it as he turn on his heels, hand thrust into his pockets. "We're not anything anymore," and he stomped out the door, slamming it shut behind him. Blaine wanted to tear after him, but he stayed glued to his spot, fighting the scream bubbling in his chest and the overwhelming impulse to reach out to Rachel hit him fast and hard, though he wasn't sure if he wanted to fuck her or cry to her, to let her hold him and tell him it would be okay, that it would be better tomorrow. And these were the things he was supposed to be mourning Sebastian for, the things he had just lost in him, the friendship and understanding and the comfort; he was supposed to be broken-hearted over this, but all he could feel past the lingering resentment was the desire to start it all over again with someone else.

With Rachel.

-:-

It was midnight before he remembers the letter, and he feels like an idiot for forgetting it in the first place. Whatever she had written had been enough to set Sebastian off and Blaine hadn't even read it for himself. He had no idea what it said really, just a few snippets here and there that he'd barely heard though Sebastian's disdain. He knew what he wanted to be in the letter, what he hoped would be, but Rachel was just as likely to run as he was and judging by the fact that she clearly hadn't been to the dorm all weekend, maybe she had. Maybe she had given up, just as he came to the realization that he couldn't.

The problem, he discovered with a quick look around the room, was the letter was nowhere to be found. He tore apart his bed and his desk before overturning everything on her side, but it was gone, disappeared. He crawled around of the floor, emptied the wastebaskets, even checked behind the counters in the bathroom before he accepted that it was a lost cause. Her letter wasn't there anymore; her words, her explanation, gone. He sagged against the way, suddenly exhausted and overcome with a doubt he hadn't felt in a long time. He could just call her, text her, email his own letter, knowing that wherever she was, she'd get it. But what if she was saying goodbye, or apologizing for leading him on, for letting him believe their arrangement had been more than a physical need he just happened to meet, a lie to keep stringing him along.

He wasn't sure he could take that kind of disappointment and he knew it was his cowardly side shining through, the person in him that was content to sail through his own life with a passive disinterest. It was a wall he was so used to putting him that knocking it down felt so raw and heady, like a mistake in the making. But he'd let it down with her, given into himself over and over again, and he knew it was more than just exploring the idea of passion, or the dark attraction of wanting what wasn't good for him. It was just... her and how he felt about her, and her smile and laugh, and the jokes she told that weren't really funny but she was so enthusiastic about them. It was in how she feel laid out beside him, hand intertwined in his when they napped, just resting. How she would kiss his cheek when she woke up in the morning, wanting nothing in return.

He was at a loss for words to describe it, but it was something and that something was real. It was deep, and deepening, and nothing anyone said would change his mind. If he could just talk to her... he didn't know what he would say. He would try to tell her he wanted more, that he was serious and he had made that decision she had asked him to before, that he was sorry for taking so long, that the obvious answer was the hardest one and he had never been good at making the hard decisions. But that he would for her, he would try and he would get better. He would be what she needed, and if he wasn't already, he would learn to be.

He fell asleep practicing, trying to organize all his thoughts into some kind of order, and it was well after noon Sunday when he woke up. He groaned as he tried to pick himself off the floor, his bones creaking in protest; Rachel still wasn't back – might never be back, his guilt whispered at him – and he was tempted to chase her down, make her listen to him despite what her letter may or may not have said, because he didn't want to lose her. He wanted to have her, all of her, and he wanted to fix the mistakes he'd made because even at his worst, he'd fallen in love with her. And that was it, he realized. That was the truth he'd been hiding from, trying to find the words to dance around with, but it all boiled down to those simple little sentiments.

He just didn't know where to look. She was obviously off campus and he had no idea where her fathers' house was, or where she might have gone to. He guessed Lima, he guessed Quinn's, but he had no idea where she lived or how to even begin to get there. All he could really do was wait and hope that when she reappeared, she would listen to him.

He stayed in the shower until the water ran cold because he didn't have much else to do, jumping at every little click of a door as students came back from the weekend, listening for one that sounded close enough to be his, to be her. His nerves were draining the longer the day went on without word from her, and it wasn't until an hour before curfew that anything at all happens. An envelope sliding under the door, unmarked but with a post-it note attached the the front. Blaine's heart skipped a beat as he recognized Sebastian's handwriting, the words "Don't be an idiot" scrawled across the tiny square.

Her letter is inside, crumbled and torn, taped back together and Blaine knows it's Sebastian's doing, how much it had taken for him to give this back, because reading it and hearing in her words everything that Blaine himself had been holding inside, he can't control himself. He can't just sit by and let this happen and it didn't matter than he would be out way past curfew, that he didn't know his way around Lima and he could very well end up lost in Ohio for days with his sense of direction. He needed to look her in the eye and tell her that she wasn't alone, that he wanted her too. That he loved her.

He grabbed his keys and swung the door open hurriedly, a surprised gasp stopping him in his tracks; he might have laughed if he wasn't so relieved, because there she was, pink duffle bag hanging off her shoulder as she looked at him with wide eyes. "Rachel!" he exclaimed loudly, startling even himself.

"Where are you going?" she whispered, a stark contrast to his own voice and he wanted to kick himself because he knew now that she'd been waiting for him to reach out to her all weekend, having put her heart on the line, been vulnerable and as crazy as he felt he had gone warring with himself, he could only imagine what it had been like for her. And it looked like he was leaving, standing with his keys in one hand her letter in the other, his jacket half on. He looked like he was running.

"To find you," he said, a smile slipping past his lips as she looked at him with hopeful eyes. He dropped everything in his hands, needing only to hold her, to feel her against him. To hear her heart skip the same beat his did when she was around him, to know that she wasn't lost, that he still had a chance. "I was going to find you because I-"

Rachel didn't let him finish, her bag dropping to the floor as her arms flung around his neck, lips against his before he could even think. It's something new, a first for them, out in the open and full of an understanding beyond the meeting of skin on skin. It's fresh and terrifying, and there was still so much they would have to work out, but it didn't quite matter in that moment. "I love you," he finally whispered as their kiss broke, and she giggled breathlessly against his neck, her arms clutching him closer.

* * *

**AN: **That's it! We're done! And Kira's really sorry it took her so long, since this was her chapter to finish and she's easily distracted between school and finals and work and we both had other projects going on at the same time. But we've had a lot of fun with this one, and we hope you did too. Enjoy and thank you for reading. _~ashley and kira_


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